Edward VI, Part Three

Somerset's wartime footing finds its 'claim to fame' in what has been called the ‘Rough Wooing’ of Scotland. Though England and Scotland had enjoyed a measure of peace after the diplomatic genius of Henry VII, the peace fell apart under Henry VIII. While much of the ‘Rough Wooing’ took place during the late reign of Edward VI’s father, it came to its conclusion during the early reign of the boy king. After victory in both France and Scotland in his latest war campaigns, on 1 July 1543 Henry VIII signed the Treaty of Greenwich with the Scots, sealing the peace with Edward’s betrothal to the seven-month-old Mary, Queen of Scots (the only surviving legitimate child of King James V of Scotland). Though the Scots had rejected similar plans earlier in Henry’s reign, they were in a weak position after their defeat at Solway Moss. Henry hoped to unite the two realms, and he insisted that Mary be raised in England. Scotland’s regent, acting for the infant Queen Mary, approved the marriage but was hesitant to move forward with it because rival factions threatened to plunge Scotland into civil war. The death of James V, and the fragility of the fractured government, made politics a hot-keg waiting to blow, and blow it did – two Scottish factions forced the Scottish government to renege on the Treaty of Greenwich in December. Henry released a number of prisoners from Solway Moss in the hope that they could sway the Scots to rethink their actions, but this didn’t work: instead they renewed their Auld Alliance with France. War was just a step away, and an enraged Henry was done with fruitless diplomatic gestures. In April 1544 he ordered Edward’s uncle, the Earl of Hertford, to invade Scotland and ‘put all to fire and sword, burn Edinburgh town, so razed and defaced when you have sacked and gotten what you can of it, as there may remain forever a perpetual memory of the vengeance of God lightened upon [them] for their falsehood and disloyalty.’ Hertford did as Henry had commanded, launching England’s most brutal campaign against her northern neighbor.

Edinburgh in the late 16th century

Hertford burned St. Mynettes on the northern bank of the Forth, seizing Scottish fishing boats to ferry his army across the river onto enemy soil. They army landed at Granton and occupied Leith. The Provost of Edinburgh met with Hertford, hoping to find a solution to the present difficulties, but Henry had ordered Hertford to make no terms: Edinburgh must be destroyed. Though Edinburgh was lightly defended, Edinburgh Castle was stocked with cannon that could put a devastating fire on any approaching enemies. Hertford wasn’t there to capture the city but to destroy it, so he ignored the castle and ordered the city put to the torch. English soldiers didn’t dig in for a siege; they marched into the city and set it alight. All the houses within the suburbs and behind the city walls were burned, and the English looted what they could and loaded their prizes onto English ships (along with the captured Scottish ships Unicorn and Salamander). The ships carried their loot home by sea, but the army went home by land; and as they did so, they burned and pillaged everything they came across. 

A number of English knights made their own raids across the border from Berwick upon Tweed. One of these raids, led by a knight named Sir Ralph Eure in 1545, burnt a Scottish tower while the lady of the house, her children, and their servants were inside. When news of the atrocity reached the Scottish royal court, loggerheads were cooled and a quasi-unity among rival factions took shape. Two Scottish nobles – the Earl of Arran, acting as regent to Queen Mary, and the Earl of Angus – had been the bitterest enemies, even attacking one another’s supporters en masse in Edinburgh in 1520, but the desire for vengeance upon English brutality pulled them towards reconciliation. A large army was raised – approximately around twenty-five hundred men drawn from various noble lineages and their supporters – and they moved to confront the rampaging English near Jedburgh. The English raiders had more men: three thousand German and Spanish mercenaries, fifteen hundred English supporters under the knight Sir Brian Layton, and seven hundred ‘pro-English’ Scots (who were forced to support the English on pain of losing their families and livelihood). As the English pitched camp near Gersit Law, a small party of Scottish raiders made a feint attack before retreating towards Palace Hill. The English raiders, who had tasted nothing but victory and loot during their campaign, gave chase. As they crossed the top of Palace Hill and plunged down the far side, they found the whole Scottish army waiting for them. The Scots had all the advantages: they had the advantage of surprise, the advantage of the sun (it was setting behind them, both illuminating and blinding their enemy), and the westerly wind blew the gunpowder smoke from Scottish arquebuses and pistols into the English soldiers. Scottish pikemen charged forward, driving the English back. The uneven ground atop Palace Hill prevented the English from rallying, and desperate Scottish soldiers in the English army ripped off the red crosses that signified their allegiance to England and professed themselves allies of Scotland. The English army, broken by the surprise attack at what would be known as The Battle of Ancrum Moor, were scattered throughout the Scottish countryside – where many became easy prey for Scots eager to pay blood with blood. Sir Ralph Eure, who had burned the tower with the innocents, was slain on the battlefield; upon seeing his corpse, the Scottish Earl of Arran wept, saying, ‘God have mercy on him, for he was a fell cruel man and over cruel, which many a man and fatherless bairn might rue, and wellaway that ever such slaughter and blood-shedding be among Christian men!’ The English suffered eight hundred soldiers killed and a thousand taken prisoner. This brought an end to the ravaging of Scotland, and when Francis I of France heard news of the Scottish victory, he sent French troops across the Channel to aid the Scots in their war against England. These fresh troops didn’t amount to much, however, because hostilities ended over a year later in June 1546 when Henry VIII signed the Treaty of Camp with France. Eighteen months of peace between England and France were secured – but, as is to be expected of English and Scottish relations, this peace wasn’t to last. Both the English and the Scots had the taste for blood in their mouths.

The Battle of Ancrum Moor

The Treaty of Camp allowed the English to retain a fort they’d built at Langholm within the Scottish border. Unable to possess it by diplomacy, the Earl of Arran attempted to take it by force but was repulsed. Just a month after the peace treaty was signed, he tried again and succeeded. At the same time, a French naval force ousted pro-English Scotsmen at St. Andrews Castle. Arran had seven signal beacons prepared that could be lit if the English launched a seaward invasion; each signal beacon had a mounted rider who would ride to the next beacon if an invasion came during the daytime; and the Scots near the beacons were ordered to make themselves ready to fight if the beacons were lit. In January 1547 Henry VIII died, and the throne passed to Edward VI. Now both England and Scotland were under minor monarchs, both ruled by regents. The English regent, the Duke of Somerset, took the reigns of government, and he orchestrated the invasion of Scotland that the Scots were expecting.

In early September 1547, he led a large army supported by thirty warships into Scotland. Arran’s representative in London observed the English marshalling for war and warned Arran of the impending invasion. Somerset had close to seventeen thousand men; these included county levies armed with longbow and bill, several hundred German arquebusiers, Spanish and Italian mounted arquebusiers, and six thousand cavalry. The cavalry were commanded by Lord Grey of Wilton, the High Marshal of the Army, and the infantry were commanded by the Earl of Warwick, Lord Dacre of Gillesland, and Somerset. Somerset marched his host east along the Scottish coast so that he could keep in contact (and in supply) with the English warships. Scottish raiders harassed his columns, but they were swatted away like annoying gnats. To the west, a smaller diversionary force of five thousand men took Castlemilk in Annandale and burnt Annan after a bloody skirmish to capture the fortified church. As the English marched, Arran levied an army numbering anywhere between twenty-two and thirty-six thousand. The Scottish numbers dwarfed those of the English. Most of Arran’s soldiers were pikemen with a spattering of highland archers; he had several artillery pieces, but they were more primitive than those brought by the English. His cavalry numbered only a third of those the English were bringing to the field, and many of the Scottish cavalry were unreliable border skirmishers. Arran placed his men on the slopes of the western bank of the River Esk, hoping to bar Somerset’s progress. The Firth of Forth protected his left flank, and a bog protected his right. Crude earthworks mounted with cannon and arquebuses were mounted, and Arran ordered some of the cannons to point into the Forth to keep the enemy warships from coming too close and supporting the English.

On 9 September Somerset’s army took position on Falside Hill just three miles east of Arran’s encampment. The Scottish Earl of Home, in a chivalric but nearsighted gesture, led fifteen hundred horsemen close to the English and challenged an equal number of English cavalry to cross swords. Lord Grey begged Somerset to let him teach the Scots a thing or two, and Somerset reluctantly acquiesced – much to Scottish dismay. Lord Grey led a thousand heavily armored men-at-arms and five hundred lighter demi-lancers against the Scottish cavalry. The Scots were run through, routed, and pursued. Home’s foolishness stripped Arran of most of his cavalry. A few hours later, Somerset sent guns to occupy the Inveresk Slopes overlooking the Scottish earthworks. Come nightfall Somerset received two more challenges from the Scots: one was Arran requesting that he and Somerset decide things by single combat, and another requested that the fate of the battle lie with trial-by-combat for twenty champions from each side. Somerset rejected both entreaties. The next day, 10 September, he linked his army with the guns he’d dispatched to the Inveresk Slopes only to find that Arran had shifted his army across the Esk via a Roman bridge and was marching with haste to meet him; Arran knew his antique guns were no match for Somerset’s modern artillery, and he wanted to use his pikemen to chew close into the English positions before cannon rounds could tear the heart out of his attack.

The English artillery firing upon the Scottish levies at Pinkie Clugh

Arran’s movements, however, exposed his men to fire from the English warships offshore. The ships fired on Arran’s flank, forcing his men to coagulate in the middle of the attack as they neared the English positions. Somerset focused on the other flank, ordering his cavalry to harass them and delay their advance. The pikemen easily repulsed the enemy cavalry; Lord Grey was wounded by a pike thrust through his throat and into his mouth. At this point the English artillery opened up on the Scots, and the Scottish host was subject to withering fire from three sides. Cannons from the warships, entrenched artillery on the Inveresk Slopes, as well as arquebusiers and archers, fired into the Scottish levies. The Scots couldn’t make any sort of reply; they broke, and the English cavalry rejoined the battle. A number of Scottish soldiers were killed as they tried to escape through the bog, and many more drowned when they tried to cross the fast-flowing Esk. An English eyewitness, William Patten, described the carnage:

‘Soon after this notable strewing of their footmen’s weapons, began a pitiful sight of the dead corpses lying dispersed abroad, some their legs off, some but [hewed] and left lying half-dead, some thrust quite through the body, others the arms cut off, diverse their necks half asunder, many their heads cloven, of sundry the brains [bashed] out, some others again their heads quite off, with other many kinds of killing. After that and further in chase, all for the most part killed either in the head or in the neck, for our horsemen could not well reach the lower with their swords. And thus with blood and slaughter of the enemy, this chase was continued… in all which space, the dead bodies lay as thick as a man may note cattle grazing in a full replenished pasture. The river ran all red with blood, so that in the same chase were counted, as well by some of our men that somewhat diligently did mark it as by some of them taken prisoners, that very much did lament it, to have been slain about fourteen thousand. In all this compass of ground what with weapons, arms, hands, legs, heads, blood and dead bodies… the mortality was so great, as it was thought, the like aforetime not to have been seen.’

Scottish cavalry repulsed by English pikemen

At the end of the day’s fighting, the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh cost the Scottish army fifteen thousand lives and two thousand prisoners; the English suffered a mere two to six hundred killed. Though modern historians see this battle as a Renaissance Army vs. Medieval Army (with the Medieval-style army losing), some Scottish contemporaries blamed defeat on turncoats within the Scottish fold. The Holy Roman Emperor’s ambassador to England reported rumors that, just prior to the battle, the Scottish advance horsemen dismounted and crossed their pikes and stood in close formation; after this the Earl of Warwick attempted to attack the Scots from behind using smoky fires as a diversion. Upon engaging the Scottish rearguard the Scots took flight, following the lead of several soldiers who had an ‘understanding’ with Somerset. The rest of the Scots, those loyal to Arran, fled the field when they saw the turncoats departing. Regardless of the truth of such rumors, the Scots lost the battle – but they were not yet wooed. Arran, who survived the battle and remained steadfast over the Scottish government, refused to come to terms with England. The baby Queen Mary was smuggled to France where she was (much to Arran’s dismay) engaged to the Dauphin Francis. Somerset seized upon his victory by establishing strongholds throughout the Lowlands and Borders, but absent peace these toeholds on Scottish soil served only to drain the crown’s treasury. By spring 1549 the English had thirty-two hundred soldiers garrisoning the frontier along with seventeen hundred German and five hundred Spanish and Italian mercenaries. These were tasked with holding onto the territories that had been gained after Pinkie Cleugh, but the Scots gave them a hard time of it. Reinforced with military and financial assistance from France, the Scots didn’t let the English rest. The countryside became a tableau of skirmishes and sieges. 

Hostilities between the English and Scots came to a close once more with the Treaty of Boulogne in March 1550. This treaty was fashioned on the Continent, between France and England, and incorporated the Scottish hostilities by fact of the Auld Alliance. Per the treaty, prisoners were returned and border fortifications dismantled. Boulogne, which had been captured by Henry VIII in his last campaign against France, was returned to the French fold along with all her guns (a sizeable collection). In France, King Henry II enjoyed a triumphal entry to Rouen on 1 October 1550. Mary of Guise and Mary, Queen of Scots, took part. Banners depicted French victories in Scotland.