Julian Rathbone - Kings of Albion

There were men on horseback too, but the horses tired easily under such a weight of armour, over rough ground, and were vulnerable to archers. The commander of a company of men-at-arms, whom he had probably recruited himself, remained mounted so he and his standard could be seen, and he might have mounted men around him. squires and relations who would not only protect him but serve as messengers to and from the overall commander of that part of the field. For the rest, the cavalry rarely charged in formation: stalwart Infantry, if holding ground protected by stakes or firmly held pikes, could always turn them. However, the cavalry came into its own in the pursuit of a beaten enemy, to charge in surprise the flank of a body of men-at-arms already pressed from the front, and so forth.

We should bear all this in mind when we consider how to cope with the Bahmani cavalry. Well-trained and -armed infantry may be a better solution than attempting to counter horsemen with horsemen.

Back to the melee. Few men-at-arms were killed outright in hand-to-hand fighting – the armour saw to that – but any man-at-arms who was beaten to the ground by the force and weight of blows on his armour, or slipping in the snow and blood, was in mortal danger. His fate now depended on the success or failure of his companions. If they were winning, moving forward pace by pace, they might pass over him and the ranks behind would bring him succour, quite often simply a matter of getting him to his feet and pushing him back into the light. If, however, his side was slipping back he would soon find himself amongst his enemies, whose first instinct would be to continue to batter him with their heaviest blows, denting his armour and crushing his body inside it. A few yards on, men would risk the time taken to loosen his armour in his groin or armpit and stab him with a dagger, or thrust one through his slitted visor. Once dead he was stripped of his armour and anything of value he might have on his person, either there and then or when the battle was over, and thrown into a gravepit along with hundreds, thousands of others.

You will understand from this process that all men-at-arms going into a battle knew they faced one of two fates depending on whether their side or the other gave ground first. To give ground was to invite defeat and death. Fear of losing was a motive as great or greater for fighting with the utmost savagery as a desire to win. Once a sense grew within a body of men that ground was being lost and that therefore a fall meant almost certain death, the desire to turn and run ahead of one's fellows, became overwhelming. But before that happened you fought like a mad devil to forestall it.

However, two other factors delayed this catastrophic moment. First, reputation. To be known as one of the first to flee was a terrible dishonour, leading to possible-punishment, and certain ostracism for a lifetime, a loss of livelihood in the army and even out of it, the scorn of men and women alike for ever. And there was not much point in fleeing unless one was the first to do so…

The second reason for not running lay in the nature of these cases of armour. Once inside them, and especially once-inside the visored helmet, one became an automaton, a thing without conscience, pity or restraint, a machine fighting machines whose faces one could not see. Once the battle madness had taken hold, one did not stop but went on, kill, kill, kill until either one was killed or there were none left in front to fight.

This is very different of course from the way our Dravidians behave on a battlefield. In scant armour and with physiques better adapted to running than wielding huge and heavy weapons, with families who depend on them to till the rich land behind them, they find it too easy to retreat.

So, this is the sort of fighting that was taking place along the seam of blood between the two armies, terror, triumph and above all desperation, sewing them together.

Two separate movements of the Queen's troops now had an accidental but profound effect on the outcome…

Eddie. He was in the centre and as he saw the Queen's army marching in a huge solid phalanx towards him he must have felt a moment of doubt, of fear. Until the old Duke of Norfolk came up, his was the smaller army. The Queen's army had won the last two major engagements at Wakefield and St Alban's, and at Northampton the numbers had been two to one in favour of the Yorkists. Anyway, young man as he was, he pushed up his visor so it looked like a giant beak over his head, and hacked along the line in the rapidly shrinking gap between the armies. Fine snow was swirling about him, beginning to settle on the grass.

'My lords,' he shouted, above the jangle of his armour and the thud of Genet's hooves, 'you're here because you want me to be your king. You're here because for sixty years Albion has been ruled by cruel usurpers. I am the heir. I am the Plantagenet. Fight for me today to lift this curse from the soil of Albion, and if you do not believe my cause is right then for God's sake go…'

It had an effect. The front ranks, mostly filled with nobles, gave a cheer and pressed forward. At that moment Genet stumbled a little, perhaps hit in the buttock by a Lancastrian arrow, Eddie heaved on the reins, got him upright but still thrashing about, turning and twisting. He drew his sword, slipped to the ground and handed the reins to the ostler who followed him.

'Come on lads,' he shouted, 'today your king fights on the ground beside you, and I will live or die with you. May I rot in hell if you see me rehorsed to flee the field. When I ride again it will be through the gates of York…' And he gave his sword a sort of flourish and, pulling down his visor, turned to face the Queen's army, that was now only fifty paces away and all bellowing 'Henry, King Henry!'

'Where were you in all this?' I asked.

'On the Yorkist right, hanging a little back but half-way up the slope towards the road that ran along the hill, we had the cannon just above and ahead of us. It was a good place to see what was happening…"

'Ah, the cannon. What happened with them?'

'Usual story. Filthy weather, driving snow, the buggers didn't work. But they had some effect.'

'How was that then?'

'The Queen's left were coming in across the slope which was difficult anyway, and all the time they were looking up the hill into the muzzles of the guns. They could see how they were lined up, how another fifty, forty, twenty, ten yards would bring them into their line of fire. They hung back. Who wouldn't. It was the beginning, the seed of the end for the Queen's army.'

'How so?'

'Hang on a bit and I'll tell you.' He cleared his throat. 'Fucking, excuse my Inglysshe, fucking monsoon always leaves me full of phlegm…

'For the next three hours or more,' he went on, 'it was just simply the foulest sort of fighting I've ever seen…'

'I'm sorry, but could you explain why you were there?' I asked.

‘I told you. We were there to get back the Prince's crossbows.' 'But why in that part of the field?'

'Because that's where the crossbows had ended up. They were still in their cases… the troop with them had got lost and arrived up the road from Ferrybridge just before the battle started. The Prince spotted their arrival and took us all over to them. He offered the Genoese Sergeant in charge a handful of rubies, almost the last we had, if he'd keep them in their cases. Can I go on now?'

'Of course.' Ali returned to the papers in front of him.

Soon inside every armour casing along that seam there was blood, crushed bones, urine, faeces, fear and intolerable pain. For all the din of clashing metal, the shouts and war-cries of those behind, the only audible sounds within all those shells of metal will often have been the howls of pain of those who wore them, until it would be almost a relief to go down. Imagine the darkness inside, the slit to peer through, or a sieve of tiny holes, the confusion of shapes outside, the weight, the shock as an axe or mace thudded into you, even the cold. It was close to freezing, the temperature when water turns to ice and metal burns almost as badly as when it is hot. And then the panic when your knees begin to go, or the sudden stab of fear when a blow sends you flat on your back as helpless as an upturned beetle.