Jack Ludlow - Soldier of Crusade

‘Ten days to get there, ten to forage and ten back at least,’ Raymond protested. ‘Do you not think our Turks watching from their citadel will not notice?’

Bohemund spoke up then. ‘Are you saying we cannot contain them even with half our strength?’

That flummoxed Raymond; if he believed he could not hold them he was admitting to the fact the siege was an error — the host outnumbered the defender six to one at even the most limited estimate.

‘I would undertake to do that,’ Bohemund added, which stung the Provencal magnate’s pride. ‘There is no need when my knights are present. They alone can seal the walls.’

‘Then, Count Raymond,’ interjected Robert of Normandy, ‘you will not object to your foot soldiers driving the carts?’

‘Do you intend to lead, Duke Robert?’

That gentle enquiry from Godfrey de Bouillon got a shake of the head. ‘I will put forward my brother-in-law of Flanders.’

‘An excellent choice,’ Ademar exclaimed, with such faux enthusiasm he made it sound the very opposite.

Godfrey spoke next. ‘Would you, Count Bohemund, agree to share the venture?’

‘Surely it is the turn of others?’

‘How can it be, my friend, when you so recently defeated our enemies in open conflict?’

‘I am willing to serve as the council directs.’

The plateau referred to by the Duke of Normandy lay well to the south-east of Antioch and as had already been stated it was, for the kind of cavalcade led by his brother-in-law and Count Bohemund, a long and slow march to get there. Both commanded large bodies of knights, some three hundred each in number, enough to cow the locals into cooperation as well as to deal with any groups of Turks they might encounter.

Where Bohemund had come to enjoy common ground with Duke Robert on the way to Dorylaeum, he found the Count of Flanders less forthcoming in that regard, he being aloof and much concerned that he was as much a knight and commander as the Norman and that his authority over his own lances should not in any way be compromised. Added to that, those on foot were Raymond of Toulouse’s men and they proved unruly, their captains just as unwilling to bow the knee to Norman or Frank.

The success of their mission made such a situation tolerable; while acting in concert they operated in a semi-independent fashion, ranging far and wide over what was a land full of milk and honey compared to Antioch, loading up their beast of burden and their carts until they were fully laden, eventually coming together to camp side by side with the intention of starting back for Antioch on the next morning, the troops of Flanders to the east and the Normans to their rear.

It was never established whose duty it was to send out scouts, each man blamed the other for the failure to do so and that continued all the way to the later chronicles of the Crusade; all that mattered was there were none, or too few to give warning of the threat that was approaching the foraging force. The sight of a large party of Turks at dawn, observing their positions, was in itself alarming and set the camp into a rush to get ready to move. Riding out to assess the level of danger Bohemund got a shock greater than any he had ever experienced, for, from an elevated observation point, he could see that the land to the east was covered in marching men; this was no roving squadron but a full-scale army, obviously headed for Antioch, and one that massively outnumbered the Crusaders.

Hastening back to the lines he harried the drovers and milities to get their carts and animals into motion in the hope of putting some distance between them and the Turks, quick to curse the Count of Flanders for the fact of such a force being a surprise. There were grounds for that, if they were slender — the mounted men of Flanders had operated close to the enemy line of march — but it was, in truth, the fault of both men to allow themselves to feel so secure that no duty for protection had been discussed.

To say it was a race to get clear was risible; the sole hope was that the approaching Turkish host would have in mind some other objective and that the sight of the foraging Franks would not divert them from that. It proved to be a false dream almost before they cleared the overnight encampment, as Turkish cavalry appeared on the far hillsides in numbers, clearly intent on forcing battle. With sinking hearts the two leaders knew the Muslim foot would be hot on their heels. Worse, the mounted warriors split into twin columns and set off with the clear intention of getting ahead of the Crusaders before coming together and blocking their route to the west and there was little either Count could do to prevent it.

Running for the whole foraging party was not an option; too many were foot bound, quite apart from their encumbrances, so they were ordered to make a corral with their wagons, into which they should lead their donkeys, mules and packhorses, and to then form a defence around that while the knights sought to drive off the enemy enough to create a corridor of escape. To the west the Turks were coming in from both the pincers to close the gap, leaving the lances no choice but to seek to force a way through.

Robert of Flanders declined to give first chance to the Normans — or was it their commander, for whose fame and reputation he now openly demonstrated his disdain? Gathering his knights he set off to stop the completion of that encircling movement, Bohemund electing not to join him but determined to hold his men together so that he could react to whatever came next. The knights of Flanders did good service, crushing the line of Turks before them, which allowed Bohemund to split his forces and attack the two wings which were now in confusion, thus opening the potential for flight by all.

With their weight superiority the Crusader knights were doing great slaughter and driving back the enemy so that the route west was clear. Hard as they fought to hold open that corridor, and despite an order to move, abandoning wagons and animals, including the stores they had worked so hard to collect, it soon became clear that the milities felt safer in their wagon-bound enclave than in the open and when they should have moved they stayed put. Never having the discipline of their mounted confreres, regardless of where they came from, no amount of browbeating would make them budge.

Both Bohemund and Robert of Flanders were in a bind: if they went to the rescue of their Provencal milities they would be riding back into the Turkish trap, and pouring towards that square of wagons were thousands of Turkish foot, too many for a force of five hundred knights to beat off unless they could be induced to panic. Why would they do that when on either flank they still had mounted men ready to fall upon their enemy?

It had to be attempted, there was no choice; mounts which had already been in action once were kicked into motion once more to filter round the wagons on both sides, one half of the field the ragged lances of Flanders, the other the near-to-neat line of Normans. The effect was immediate in that the Turks halted their onward progress, yet they were numerically so superior that the hoped for wave of dread and flight did not materialise; they formed a firm line ready to resist the charge of heavy cavalry under command of men who held them steady.

For their bravery the men at the front died in droves, speared, sliced, cut and trampled by the sheer weight of what hit them, and soon the knights were doing execution in staggering quantities, though not without losses of their own. Bohemund, in between slaying his foes, realised that the cavalry they had driven back were now re-formed and about to repeat their previous manoeuvre, only this time they would be close to and in support of their own foot, a potentially deadly combination.