White John White - Lays and Legends of the English Lake Country

Broughton Tower, the ancient part of which is all that remains of the residence of the unfortunate Sir Thomas Broughton, stands a little to the eastward of the town of that name, upon the neck of a wooded spur of land, which projects from the high ground above the houses towards the river Duddon, about a mile distant. The towered portion, as it rises from the wood, has much of the appearance of a church; but is in reality part of the ancient building, now connected with a modern mansion. It has a southern aspect, with a slope down to the river, being well sheltered in the opposite direction. "It commands an extensive view, comprising in a wonderful variety hill and dale, water, wooded grounds, and buildings; whilst fertility around is gradually diminished, being lost in the superior heights of Black Comb, in Cumberland, the high lands between Kirkby and Ulverston, and the estuary of the Duddon expanding into the sands and waters of the Irish sea."

The Broughtons were an Anglo-Saxon family of high antiquity, in whose possession the manor of Broughton had remained from time immemorial, and whose chief seat was at Broughton, until the second year of the reign of Henry the Seventh. At this period the power and interest of Sir Thomas Broughton were so considerable, that the Duchess of Burgundy, sister to the late King and the Duke of Clarence, relied on him as one of the principal confederates in the attempt to subvert the government of Henry by the pretensions of Lambert Simnel.

Ireland was zealously attached to the house of York, and held in affectionate regard the memory of the Duke of Clarence, the Earl of Warwick's father, who had been its lieutenant. No sooner, therefore, did the impostor Simnel present himself to Thomas Fitz-Gerald, Earl of Kildare, and claim his protection as the unfortunate Warwick, than that credulous nobleman paved the way for his reception, and furthered his design upon the throne, till the people in Dublin with one consent tendered their allegiance to him as the true Plantagenet. They paid the pretended Prince attendance as their sovereign, lodged him in the Castle of Dublin, crowned him with a diadem taken from a statue of the Virgin, and publicly proclaimed him King, by the appellation of Edward the Sixth.

In the year 1487 Lambert, with about two thousand Flemish troops under the command of Colonel Martin Swart, a man of noble family in Germany, an experienced and valiant soldier, whom the Duchess of Burgundy had chosen to support the pretended title of Simnel to the crown of England, and a number of Irish, conducted by Thomas Gerardine their captain from Ireland, landed in Furness at the Pile of Fouldrey. The army encamped in the neighbourhood of Ulverston, at a place now known by the name of Swart-Moor. Sir Thomas Broughton joined the rebels with a small body of English. The army, at this time about eight thousand strong, proceeded to join the Earl of Lincoln, Lord Lovel, and the rest of the confederates, passing on through Cartmel to Stoke field, near Newark-upon-Trent, where they met and encountered the King's forces on the 5th of June, 1487.

The day being far advanced before the King arrived at Stoke, he pitched his camp and deferred the battle till the day following. The forces of the Earl of Lincoln also encamped at a little distance from those of the King, and undismayed by the superior numbers they had to encounter, bravely entered the field the next day, and arranged themselves for battle, according to the directions of Colonel Swart and other superior officers. The charge being sounded, a desperate conflict was maintained with equal valour on both sides for three hours. The Germans were in every respect equal to the English, and none surpassed the bravery of Swart their commander. For three hours each side contended for victory, and the fate of the battle remained doubtful. The Irish soldiers, however, being badly armed, and the Germans being overpowered by numbers, the Lambertines were at length defeated, but not before their principal officers, the Earl of Lincoln, Lord Lovel, Sir Thomas Broughton , Colonel Swart, and Sir Thomas Gerardine captain of the Irish, and upwards of four thousand of their soldiers were slain.