The
Battle of Bosworth Field
Primary
and Contemporary Sources
IV. The
Mainstream of Tudor Historiography
From Bennett,
Michael. The Battle of Bosworth, reprinted by kind permission
of the author. HTML markup by Judie C. Gall.
DATE: c.
1500. AUTHOR: Bernard André, French humanist in service of
Henry VII. TEXT: B. André, 'Vita Henrici Septimi'
in Memorials of King Henry VII, ed. J. Gairdner (London,
Roll Series, 1858), p. 32. (Latin; own translation.)
After gaining
military assistance from the king of France, Henry Tudor lands
in Wales, with the earl of Oxford and Lord Chandée as his
commanders. King Richard reacts furiously, ordering his retainers
to destroy the rebels with fire and sword. He summons the armed
might of the kingdom, but Lord Stanley and his kinsmen go over
to the pretender. On the battle itself, André simply notes:
'I have learned
somewhat of this battle from oral sources, but in this matter
the eye is a more reliable witness than the ear. Rather than affirm
anything rashly, therefore, I pass over the date, place and order
of battle, for as I have said I lack the illumination of eye-witnesses.
Until I am more fully instructed, for this field of battle, I
shall leave blank a space as broad * * * * *'
He then records
the celebrations and speech of thanksgiving, noting the presence
among the victorious troops of his clerical colleagues the bishop
of Winchester, the bishop of St. Asaph and the dean of Windsor,
namely Richard Fox, Michael Deacon and Christopher Urswick. More
gaps are left for details of the burial of Richard III and the
names of the captives. Saturday is given as the day of the battle.
[Back to Contemporary and Tudor Accounts]
DATE: 1500-13.
AUTHOR: Robert Fabian (d. 1513), citizen of London. TEXTS: The
Chronicle of Fabian, which he nameth the Concordance of Histories
newly perused and continued from the beginnyng of Kyng Henry the
Seventh to th' End of Queene Mary (London, 1559), pp. 519-20;
The Great Chronicle of London, ed. A.H. Thomas and I.D.
Thornley (London, 1938), pp. 237-8. (English: spelling modernised.)
Fabian's
Chronicle reports in a few sentences the landing of Henry
Tudor, his growing number of supporters, including 'such as were
in sundry sanctuaries', and the king's rapid mobilisation. The
armies meet at 'a village in Leicestershire named Bosworth'. A
'sharp battle' is fought, 'and sharper it should have been, if
the king's party had been fast to him. But many toward the field
refused him, and went unto that other party. And some stood hoving
afar off till they saw to which party the victory fell'. The Great
Chronicle is more wordy:
'Then King
Richard in all haste arrayed his people and made quick provision
for to meet his enemies which at the beginning were but of small
strength. But as soon as his landing was known to many of the
knights and squires of this land, they gathered much people in
the king's name and straight sped them unto that other party,
by means whereof his power hugely increased. Then King Richard
being well accompanied sped him towards his said enemies till
he came to Leicester, and that other party which in this while
had proclaimed himself King Henry VII drew fast thitherward. But
that night King Richard lost much of his people, for many gentlemen
that held good countenance with master Brackenbury then lieutenant
of the Tower, and had for many of them done right kindly, took
their leave of him, in giving to him thanks for his kindness before
showed, and exhorted him to go with them, for they feared not
to show unto him that they would go unto that other party, and
so departed, leaving him almost alone. In this while the earl
of Derby and the earl of Northumberland which had each of them
great company made slow progress toward King Richard, so that
he departed from Leicester with great triumph and pomp upon the
morn being the 22 August, and after continued his journey till
he came unto a village called Bosworth where in the fields adjoining
both hosts met, and fought a sharp and long fight whereof in the
end, the victory fell unto King Henry. In this battle was slain
King Richard, the duke of Norfolk, the Lord Lovell with Brackenbury
and many others. And incontinently, as it was said, Sir William
Stanley which won the possession of King Richard's helmet with
the crown being upon it came straight to King Henry and set it
upon his head saying, "Sir, here I make you King of England".
In this field was taken the earl of Surrey with others.
'And thus
by great fortune and grace upon 22 August won this noble prince
possession of this land, and then he was conveyed to Leicester
the same night, and there received with all honour and gladness.
And Richard late King as gloriously as he by the morning departed
from that town, so as irreverently was he that afternoon brought
into that town, for his body despoiled to the skin, and nought
being left about him, so much as would cover his privy member,
he was trussed behind the pursuivant called Norroy as an hog or
another vile beast, and so all besprung with mire and filth was
brought to a church in Leicester for all men to wonder upon, and
there lastly irreverently buried.' [Back to Contemporary
and Tudor Accounts]
DATE: Composed
c. 1503-13, though not published until 1534. AUTHOR: Polydore
Vergil of Urbino, in England from 1502, wrote at request of Henry
VII. TEXT: Polydori Vergilii Urbinatis Anglicæ Historiæ
Libri Vigintiseptem (Basel, 1555), pp. 562-4 (Latin; own
translation, with assistance of Dr. R. Develin, Classics Department,
University of Tasmania; also see the sixteenth-century
English translation published as Three Books of Polydore
Vergil's 'English History', comprising the Reigns of Henry VI,
Edward IV and Richard III, from an Early Translation, preserved
among the Manuscripts of the Old Royal Library in the British
Museum, ed. H. Ellis (Camden Society, old series 29, 1844),
pp. 221-6.)
Polydore
Vergil recounts in some detail the progress of Henry Tudor from
Milford Haven and the prepartions by King Richard to resist him.
He describes a meeting between the pretender and the Stanleys
at Atherstone, at which a common strategy is agreed upon. In the
mean time the royal army moves out from Leicester, and camps near
Bosworth. During the night the king has terrible visions, which
in the chronicler's opinion were not dreams but the workings of
a guilty conscience.
'The day
after King Richard, well furnished in all things, drew his whole
army out of their encampments, and arrayed his battle-line, extended
at such a wonderful length, and composed of footmen and horsemen
packed together in such a way that the mass of armed men struck
terror in the hearts of the distant onlookers. In the front he
placed the archers, like a most strong bulwark, appointing as
their leader John, duke of Norfolk. To the rear of this long battle-line
followed the king himself, with a select force of soldiers.
'Meanwhile
... early in the morning [Henry Tudor] commanded his soldiery
to set to arms, and at the same time sent to Thomas Stanley, who
now approached the place of the fight, midway between the two
armies, to come in with his forces, so that the men could be put
in formation. He answered that Henry should set his own men in
line, while he would be at hand with his army in proper array.
Since this reply was given contrary to what was expected, and
to what the opportunity of the time and greatness of the cause
demanded, Henry became rather anxious and began to lose heart.
Nevertheless without delay he arranged his men, from necessity,
in this fashion. He drew up a simple battle-line on account of
the fewness of his men. In front of the line he placed archers,
putting the earl of Oxford in command; to defend it on the right
wing he positioned Gilbert Talbot, and on the left wing in truth
he placed John Savage. He himself, relying on the aid of Thomas
Stanley, followed with one company of horsemen and a few foot-soldiers.
For all in all the number of soldiers was scarcely 5,000, not
counting the Stanleyites of whom about 3,000 were in the battle
under the leadership of William Stanley. The king's forces were
at least twice as many.
'Thus the
battle-line on each side was arrayed. As soon as the two armies
came within sight of each other, the soldiers donned their helms
and prepared for the battle, waiting for the signal to attack
with attentive ears. There was a marsh between them, which Henry
deliberately left on his right, to serve his men as a defensive
wall. In doing this he simultaneously put the sun behind him.
The king, as soon as he saw the enemy advance past the marsh,
ordered his men to charge. Suddenly raising a great shout they
attacked first with arrows, and their opponents, in no wise holding
back from the fight, returned the fire fiercely. When it came
to close quarters, however, the dealing was done with swords.
'In the mean
time the earl of Oxford, afraid that in the fighting his men would
be surrounded by the multitude, gave out the order through the
ranks that no soldier should go more than ten feet from the standards.
When in response to the command all the men massed together and
drew back a little from the fray, their opponents, suspecting
a trick, took fright and broke off from the fighting for a while.
In truth many, who wished the king damned rather than saved, were
not reluctant to do so, and for that reason fought less stoutly.
Then the earl of Oxford on the one part, with tightly grouped
units, attacked the enemy afresh, and the others in the other
part pressing together in wedge formation renewed the battle.
While the
battle thus raged between the front lines in both sectors, Richard
learnt, first from spies, that Henry was some way off with a few
armed men as his retinue, and then, as the latter drew nearer,
recognised him more certainly from his standards. Inflamed with
anger, he spurred his horse, and road against him from the other
side, beyond the battle line. Henry saw Richard come upon him,
and since all hope of safety lay in arms, he eagerly offered himself
for this contest. In the first charge Richard killed several men;
toppled Henry's standard, along with the standard-bearer William
Brandon; contended with John Cheney, a man of surpassing bravery,
who stood in his way, and thrust him to the ground with great
force; and made a path for himself through the press of steel.
'Nevertheless
Henry held out against the attack longer than his troops, who
now almost despaired of victory, had thought likely. Then, behold,
William Stanley came in support with 3,000 men. Indeed it was
at this point that, with the rest of his men taking to their heels,
Richard was slain fighting in the thickest of the press. Meanwhile
the earl of Oxford, after a brief struggle, likewise quickly put
to flight the remainder of the troops who fought in the front
line, a great number of whom were killed in the rout. Yet many
more, who supported Richard out of fear and not out of their own
will, purposely held off from the battle, and departed unharmed,
as men who desired not the safety but the destruction of the prince
whom they detested. About 1,000 men were slain, including from
the nobility John duke of Norfolk, Walter Lord Ferrers, Robert
Brackenbury, Richard Radcliffe and several others. Two days after
at Leicester, William Catesby, lawyer, with a few associates,
was executed. Among those that took to their heels, Francis Lord
Lovell, Humphrey Stafford, with Thomas his brother, and many companions,
fled into the sanctuary of St. John which is near Colchester,
a town on the Essex coast. There was a huge number of captives,
for when Richard was killed, all men threw down their weapons,
and freely submitted themselves to Henry's obedience, which the
majority would have done at the outset, if with Richard's scouts
rushing back and forth it had been possible. Amongst them the
chief was Henry earl of Northumberland and Thomas earl of Surrey.
The latter was put in prison, whree he remained for a long time,
the former was received in favour as a friend at heart. Henry
lost in the battle scarcely a hundred soldiers, amongst whom one
notable was William Brandon, who bore Henry's battle standard.
The battle was fought on the 11th day before the kalends of September,
in the year of man's salvation 1486 [sic], and the atruggle lasted
more than two hours.
'The report
is that Richard could have saved himself by flight. His companions,
seeing from the very outset of the battle that the soldiers were
wielding their arms feebly and sluggishly, and that some were
secretly deserting, suspected treason, and urged him to flee.
When his cause obviously began to falter, they brought him a swift
horse. Yet he, who was not unaware that the people hated him,
setting aside hope of all future success, allegedly replied, such
was the great fierceness and force of his mind, that that very
day he would make an end either of war or life. Knowing for certain
that that day would either deliver him a pacified realm thenceforward
or else take it away forever, he went into the fray wearing the
royal crown, so that he might thereby make either a beginning
or an end of his reign. Thus the miserable man suddenly had such
an end as customarily befalls them that for justice, divine law
and virtue substitue wilfulness, impiety and depravity. To be
sure, these are far more forcible object-lessons than the voices
of men to deter those persons who allow no time to pass free from
some wickedness, cruelty, or mischief.
'Immediately
after gaining victory, Henry gave thanks to Almighty God with
many prayers. Then filled with unbelievable happiness, he took
himself to the nearest hill, where after he had congratulated
his soldiers and ordered them to care for the wounded and bury
the slain, he gave eternal thanks to his captains, promising that
he would remember their good services. In the mean time the soldiers
saluted him as king with a great shout, applauding him with most
willing hearts. Seeing this, Thomas Stanley immediately placed
Richard's crown, found among the spoil, on his head, as though
he had become king by command of the people, acclaimed in the
ancestral manner; and that was the first omen of his felicity.'
[Back to Contemporary and Tudor Accounts]
DATE: c.
1540. AUTHOR: Edward Hall (d. 1547), lawyer of London. TEXT: Edward
Halle, The Union of the Two Noble Families of Lancaster and
York (London, 1550) (Facsimile, 1970), 'The Tragical Doings
of King Richard the Third', fos. 29d-35. (English; spelling modernised.)
In his account
of the campaigning and deployment of troops, Hall mainly follows
Vergil's Anglica Historia, but at the appropriate point
he inserts set-speeches by the two captains:
'When both
these armies were thus ordered and all men ready to set forward,
King Richard called his chieftains together and to them said:
"Most
faithful and assured fellows, most trusty and well beloved friends
and elected captains by whose wisdom and policy I have obtained
the crown ... by whose prudent and politic counsel I have so governed
my realm ... that I have omitted nothing appertaining to the office
of a just prince ... And although in the ... obtaining of the
garland I being seduced and provoked by sinister counsel and diabolical
temptation did commit a facinorous and detestable act ... I have
with strait penance and salt tears (as I trust) expiated and clearly
purged the same offence, which abominable crime I require you
of friendship as clearly to forget, as I daily remember to deplore
and lament ... I doubt not but you know how the devil, continual
enemy to human nature ... hath entered into the hear of an unknown
Welshman (whose father I never knew, nor him personally saw) exciting
him to aspire and covet our realm, crown and dignity, and thereof
clearly to deprive and spoil us and our posterity: ye see further
how a company of traitors, thieves, outlaws and renegades of our
own nation be aid ers and partakers of his feat and enterprise,
ready at hand to overcome and oppress us: you see also what a
number of beggarly Bretons and fainthearted Frenchmen be with
him arrived to destroy us, our wives and children ... [You will]
perceive that we have manifest causes, and apparent tokens of
triumph and victory. And to begin with the earl of Richmond, captain
of this rebellion, he is a Welsh milksop, a man of small courage
and of less experience in martial acts and feats of war, brought
up by my brother's means and mine like a captive in a close cage
in the court of Francis duke of Brittany, and never saw army,
nor was exercised in martial affairs, by reason whereof he neither
can nor is able of his own wit or experience to guide or rule
an host ... Secondarily, fear not ... for when the traitors ...
shall see us with banner displayed come against them, remembering
their oath ... will either shamefully fly or humbly submit themselves
to our grace and mercy. And as for the Frenchmen and Bretons,
their valiantness is such that our noble progenitors and your
valiant parents have them oftener vanquished and overcome in one
month than they ... imagined possible .. in a whole year ... .
Wherefore, considering all these advantages, expel out of your
thoughts all doubts and avoid out of your minds all fear, and
like valiant champions advance forth your standards and essay
whether your enemies can decide and try the title of battle by
dint of sword ... . And as for me, I assure you, this day I will
triumph by glorious victory, or suffer death for immortal fame
... "
'This exhortation
encouraged all such as favoured him, but such as were present
more for dread than loved kissed them openly whom they inwardly
hated ... So was his people to him unsure and unfaithful at his
end, as he was to his nephews untrue and unnatural in his beginning.
'When the
earl of Richmond knew by his foreriders that the king was so near
embattled, he rode about his army, from rank to rank from wing
to wing, giving comfortable words to all men, and that finished
(being armed in all pieces saving his helmet) mounted on a little
hill, so that all his people might see and behold him perfectly
to their great rejoicing; for he was a man of no great stature,
but so formed and decorated with all gifts and lineaments of nature
that he seemed more an angelical creature than a terrestial personage,
his countenance and aspect was cheerful and courageous, his hair
yellow like burnished gold, his eyes grey shining and quick, prompt
and ready in answering, but of such sobriety that it could never
be judged whether he were more dull than quick in speaking (that
was his temperance). And when he had overlooked his army over
every side, he paused a while, and after with a loud voice and
bold spirit spake to his companions these or like words following:
"If
ever God gave victory to men fighting in a just quarrel ... I
doubt not but God will rather aid us (yea and fight for us) than
see us vanquished ... Our cause is so just that no enterprise
can be of more virtue, both by the laws divine and civil, for
what can be more honest, goodly or Godly quarrel than to fight
against a captain, being an homicide and murderer of his own blood
or progeny, an extreme destroyer of his nobility, and to his and
our country and the poor subjects of the same a deadly mallet,
a fiery brand and a burden intolerable. Beside him consider who
be of his band and company, such as by murder and untruth ...
have disinherited me and you ... For he that calleth himself king,
keepeth me from the crown and regiment of this noble realm and
country contrary to all justice and equity. Likewise his mates
and friends occupy your lands, cut down your woods and destroy
your manors, letting your wives and children range abroad for
their living; which persons for their penance and punishment I
doubt but not God of His goodness will either deliver into our
ha nds ... or cause them ...to fly and not abide the battle: beside
this I assure you that there be yonder in the great battle men
brought thither for fear and not for love, soldiers by force compelled
and not with good will assembled, persons which desire rather
the destruction than salvation of their master and captain ...
Behold your Richard is both Tarquin and Nero; yea, a tyrant more
than Nero, for he hath not only murdered his nephew being his
king and sovereign lord, bastarded his noble brethren and defamed
the womb of his virtuous and womanly mother, but also compassed
all the means and ways that he could invent how to stup'rate and
carnally know his own niece under the pretence of cloaked matrimony,
which lady I have sworn and promised to take to my mate and wife
... If this cause be not just, and this quarrel Godly, let God
the giver of victory judge and determine ... And this remember
... that before us be our enemies, and on either side of us such
as I neither surely trust nor greatly believe. Backward we cannot
fly: so that here we stand like sheep in a fold circumcepted and
compassed between our enemies and our doubtful friends. Therefore
let all fear be set aside, and like sworn brethren let us join
in one, for this day shall be the end of our travail and the gain
of our labour, either by honourable death or famous victory: and
as I trust the battle shall not be so sore as the profit shall
be sweet. Remember the victory is not gotten with the multitude
of men, but with the courage of hearts and valiantness of minds.
The smaller that our number is the more glory is to us if we vanquish,
if we be overcome, yet no laud is to be attributed to victors,
considering that ten men fought against one ... And now advance
forward ... true inheritors against usurpers, the scourges of
God against tyrants, display my banner with a good courage, march
forth like strong and robustious champoins, and begin the battle
like hardy conquerors, the battle is at hand, and the victory
approacheth, and if we shamefully recoil or cowardly fly, we and
all our sequel be destroyed and dishonoured forever... ."
'These cheerful
words he set forth with such gesture of his body and smiling countenance,
as though already he had vanquished his enemies and gotten the
spoil.
'Had he scantly
finished his saying, but the one army espied the other. Lord,
how hastily the soldiers buckled their helms, how quickly the
archers bent their bows and frushed their feathers, how readily
the billmen shook their bills and proved their staves, ready to
approach and join, when the terrible trumpet should sound the
bloody blast to victory or death. Between both armies there was
a great marsh which the earl of Richmond left on his right hand,
for this intent that it should be on that side of a defence for
his part, and in so doing he had the sun at his back in the faces
of his enemies. When King Richard saw the earl's company was past
the marsh he commanded with all haste to set upon them; then the
trumpets blew, and the soldiers shouted, and the king's archers
courageously let fly their arrows, the earl's bowmen stood not
still but paid them home again. The terrible shot once passed,
the armies joined and came to hand strokes, where neither sword
nor bill was spared, at which encounter Lord Stanley joined the
earl.'
After this
last insertion, Hall continues largely paraphrasing Vergil's account
of the Oxford's defensive manouevre, the break-up of the royal
vanguard, the king's final charge and death, and the battlefield
coronation. In several places additional details are offered.
Thus to the record of the death of the duke of Norfolk, he adds
that he was warned 'to refrain from the field in so much that
the night before he should set forward toward the king, one wrote
on his gate:
"Jack
of Norfolk be not too bold
For
Dicken thy master is bought and sold"
'Yet all
this notwithstanding he regarded his oath, his honour and promise
made to King Richard; like a gentleman and faithful subject to
his prince he absented himself not from his master, but as he
faithfully lived under him, so he manfully died with him to his
great fame and laud.'
In a similar
fashion after rehearsing the predicament of Lord Strange before
and during the battle, Hall notes that after the king's death
the keepers of his tents submitted themselves as prisoners of
their young hostage.
Hall ends
his account of Richard III by leaving 'to God which knew his interior
cogitations at the hour of his death, I remit the punishment of
his offences committed in his life.'
[See also
Holinshed's Chronicle,
which draws largely on Hall's and is believed to have served as
the basis for Shakespeare's play]
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