On this day in History 1297 - Battle at Stirling Bridge, Scottish rebel William Wallace beats English. The Battle of Stirling Bridge was a battle of the First War of Scottish Independence. On 11 September 1297, the forces of Andrew de Moray and William Wallace defeated the combined English forces of John de Warenne, 6th Earl of Surrey, and Hugh de Cressingham near Stirling, on the River Forth. The Earl of Surrey had won a victory over the aristocracy of Scotland at the Battle of Dunbar and his belief that he was now dealing with a rabble proved that he had greatly underestimated the Scottish forces. The small bridge at Stirling was only broad enough to allow two horsemen to cross abreast. The Scots deployed in a commanding position dominating the soft, flat ground to the north of the river. Sir Richard Lundie, a Scots knight who joined the English after the capitulation at Irvine, offered to outflank the enemy by leading a cavalry force over a nearby ford, where sixty horsemen could cross at the same time. Hugh Cressingham, King Edwards treasurer in Scotland, was anxious to avoid any unnecessary expense in prolonging the war and he persuaded the Earl to reject this advice and order a direct attack across the bridge. The Scots waited as the English knights and infantry made their slow progress across the bridge on the morning of 11 September. The disorderly Scottish army of 1296 was gone: Wallace and Morays hold over their men was tight. Earlier in the day many English and Welsh archers had crossed, only to be immediately recalled because Surrey had overslept; the Scots held back and did not attack at that time. Wallace and Moray waited, according to the Chronicle of Hemingburgh, until as many of the enemy had come over as they believed they could overcome. When the vanguard, comprising 5,400 English and Welsh infantry plus several hundred cavalry, had crossed the bridge, the attack was ordered. The Scots spearmen came down from the high ground in rapid advance towards Stirling Bridge, quickly seizing control of the English bridgehead. In the narrow space of the bridge, the massed English cavalry were incredibly vulnerable to the line of Scots spearmen holding the end of the bridge. Surreys vanguard was now cut off from the rest of the army. The heavy cavalry to the north of the river was trapped and cut to pieces (due, in part, to the strewing of caltrops[citation needed] to unseat the cavalry, making them easy targets for the Scottish forces), their comrades to the south powerless to help Hugh de Cressingham, whose body was subsequently flayed and the skin cut into small pieces for souvenirs of the victory. The Lanercost Chronicle records that Wallace had[3] a broad strip [of Cressingham’s skin]...taken from the head to the heel, to make therewith a baldrick for his sword. Losses among the infantry, many of them Welsh, were also high. Those who could throw off their armour swam across the river. Surrey, who was left with a pitiful contingent of archers, had remained to the south of the river and was still in a strong position. The bulk of his army remained intact and he could have held the line of the Forth, denying the triumphant Scots a passage to the south, but his confidence was gone. After the escape of Sir Marmaduke Tweng, an English knight from Yorkshire, Surrey ordered the bridges destruction and retreated towards Berwick, leaving the garrison at Stirling Castle isolated and abandoning the Lowlands to the rebels. James Stewart, the High Steward of Scotland, and Malcolm, Earl of Lennox, whose forces had been part of Surreys army, observing the carnage to the north of the bridge, withdrew. Then the English supply train was attacked at The Pows, a wooded marshy area, by James Stewart and the other Scots lords, killing many of the fleeing soldiers. The location of Stirling Bridge at the date of the battle is not known with certainty, but four stone piers have been found underwater just north (56°07′45″N 3°56′12″W) and at an angle to the extant 15th-century bridge, along with man-made stonework on one bank in line with the piers. The site of the fighting was along either side of an earthen causeway leading from the Abbey Craig, atop which the Wallace Monument is now located, to the northern end of the bridge. The battlefield has been inventoried and protected by Historic Scotland under the Scottish Historical Environment Policy of 2009. The Battle of Stirling Bridge was a shattering defeat for the English: it showed that under certain circumstances infantry could be superior to cavalry. It was to be some time, though, before this lesson was fully absorbed. Contemporary English chronicler Walter of Guisborough recorded the English losses in the battle as 100 cavalry and 5,000 infantry killed.[9] Scottish casualties in the battle are unrecorded, with the exception of Andrew Moray. He appears to have been injured in the battle and died of his injuries around November. Wallace went on to lead a destructive raid into northern England which did little to advance the Scots objectives,[citation needed] however the raids frightened the English army and stalled their advance. By March 1298 he had emerged as Guardian of Scotland. His glory was brief, for King Edward himself was coming north from Flanders. The two men finally met on the field of Falkirk in the summer of 1298, where Wallace was defeated.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 08:21:21 +0000
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