Nigel Tranter - The Path of the Hero King

She spread her hands helplessly, recognising the finality of his voice.

“Now, quickly. No more of talk. My lords-to your duty. Christinathat shirt of mail…”

So, within the hour, the royal army of just over 1,500 men marched out of Inverurie, northwards, the King of Scots at its head under his own great red-and-gold Lion Rampant standard carried by his armour-bearer, William de Irvine-even though the said esquire had also to prop up his royal master in the saddle. Only half a head behind rode Christina of Garmoran, no royal commands having been effective in holding her back at the Milton.

They crossed the Burgh-muir and thereafter splashed across the Uric at the same Souterford where the litter of dead bodies, men and horses, testified the accuracy of Edward Bruce’s claims. The road to Oldmeldrum followed the far east bank of the river for a couple of miles before swinging away due northwards up the long gentle slopes of a flank of Barra Hill. This was a foothills land of green rolling hogbacks and smooth grassy ridges, almost devoid of trees, with wide waterlogged troughs between. Oldmeldrum lay, a grey village on the lip of one of these lesser ridges ahead, with a clear prospect in this direction-and obviously not to be attacked directly from the low ground in front. Bruce sent the Earl of Lennox off, with some 200 horse, to make a diversion to the left, to the west, skirting the boggy Loch of Barra, for the higher ground of Lethenty and Harlaw, from which he could circle round on firm ground towards Oldmeldrum and menace Buchan’s flank. He himself swung the main body, the majority on foot, sharply right handed, off the line of the road, to follow the Bourtie valley round the back of Barra Hill itself. At this stage they were still out of sight of Buchan’s position.

Barra Hill was no mountain, rising to little more than 600 feet, but it was the bulkiest and most prominent height in the area.

Buchan almost certainly would have lookouts placed along its crest, and born his own and Lennox’s progress would be only too evident from the heights. There could be no surprise, therefore-but they might hope for some confusion.

Up the gentle green Bourtie valley, only a shallow depression in the grassy hills really, they advanced steadily north by east with protective screens of outriders right and left. Bruce could have sent parties out to clear the ridge above them, but deliberately did not do so. Now and then they caught glimpses of movement up there, and were satisfied.

The King, though distinctly light-headed and scarcely in full control of his limbs, nevertheless felt more like himself than he had done for long. Possibly Campbell’s Highland water-of-life was indeed helping though he insisted that it was that which made him dizzy. Christina watched him from just behind like a hen with one chick.

On and on up those sheep-dotted valleys they pressed, with the long bulk of Barra Hill hiding all to the left, and the land gradually shelving and opening to the northeast. In time, they had gone well past the line of Buchan’s position, even past Oldmeldrum itself, and the intervening hill was beginning to tail away into broken moorland.

If some of Bruce’s entourage, Edward included, began to fear that his

sickness had affected his wits, they had perhaps some excuse; but the

King’s stern and jaw-clenched expression did not invite questioning.

At length, with the lie of the land forcing them ever eastwards into a wilderness of moorland hummocks, Bruce called a halt to this deliberate, almost leisurely progress. And now all was changed.

As though he had suddenly wakened from some sort of trance, he had his whole force swing directly round on itself and head back whence it had come-but now at the utmost speed of foot and horse both. Back and up to the crest of Barra Hill, he commanded, with all haste. The foot he sent running and leaping across the soft ground, directly towards the whaleback ridge; the cavalry had to take the longer roundabout route, for firmer going, before they could swing off right-handed to face the fairly steep ascent of the hill itself.

It was a ragged, scattered and breathless rabble that eventually reached the summit ridge of Barra Hill that late afternoon of Christmas Eve of 1307, as the light was beginning to fade from the overcast sky, Bruce himself reeling in his saddle, with Gilbert Hay positively holding him up at one side, and Irvine at the other.

There was visibility enough left to discern the situation, however.

And none on the ridge any longer doubted the sick monarch’s wits.

The country was spread out before them, clear and open within a five-mile radius. And half-right, only about a mile away, a great host was streaming northwards, back through Oldmeldrum, in full retiral and some obvious confusion. From here it was evident that it had been drawn up in a strong position on the terraced south-facing shoulder of the hill below the village, overlooking the low ground, the loch and the road from Inverurie, its flanks well secured. But such position would have been of no avail in any attack from the rear, the north, from behind Oldmeldrum. Bruce’s ruse had worked. Buchan’s scouts, spaced along this dominant ridge, and now fleeing after their main body, had sent word that the royal force was making a great pincers-move to the northeast.

Lennox’s manoeuvre, plain to view on the other side, would give the same impression. The Comyn, concerned not to be trapped from the higher ground to the north, had abandoned his position and turned his whole army round, to make for a new defensive site further back. The King did not wait until all his array was drawn up on the hilltop He ordered his trumpets to blare the advance, the charge, and leaving Hay and Fraser to bring on the foot with all speed, plunged headlong downhill, in the forefront of his line, dizziness apparently gone. Edward led the cavalry on the right and Campbell on the left. Only a little way in the rear, Christina MacRuarie maintained her position, black hair streaming like a banner in the wind.

Buchan did not fail to perceive the threat of this unexpected assault, and made swift dispositions to meet it-or tried to. But to turn a host of horse and foot round on itself, in any sort of order, is not a thing to be rushed. When the host is already strung out and scattered in some confusion by a previous sudden about-turn, and on the move to find a new position in the rear, the manoeuvre becomes little short of the impossible. Chaos developed on the northern flank of Barra Hill, as the royal array thundered down from the main ridge, trumpets braying, hooves drumming, armour clanking, with everywhere men yelling “A Bruce! A Bruce!”

Buchan was no poltroon, and he had stout and able lieutenants, notably Sir Walter Comyn of Kinedar, Sir William Comyn of Slains, Sir Alexander Baliol of Cavers, Sir David de Brechin—who arrogated to himself the title of The Flower of Chivalry-and the veteran Sir John de Moubray. They managed to rally much of their cavalry, but had less of a grip on the infantry.

Indeed quickly the latter got completely out of hand, milling this way and that in disorder and in panic, so that soon their own horse were riding them down, led by the knights, in their desperate efforts to turn back and create a front of sorts against the enemy.

From the start of the charge the Comyns had only some five or six minutes to turn, reform and take up a defensive position, before the King’s cavalry was upon them. It was not possible. While still the leaders were seeking to bring up and marshal their scattered men, the foremost ranks of the royal horse surged up in a yelling smiting tide. As might be expected, it was the right wing under the fiery Edward Bruce which reached them first.

Even so, Buchan’s knights and chivalry put up a good fight, less than prominent as was their master in the business. But against the impetus of that charge, the lack of central direction, the utter chaos behind with the foot useless and fleeing, they were beaten before they started-especially when Lennox’s squadron put in an appearance along their right flank. Moreover, almost certainly the fact that the King himself was seen to be leading the assault in person under his renowned royal standard, had a notable effect, not least on his High Constable. Bruce’s reputation as a strategist had swept the country in these last ten months-and Buchan for one had thought him safely prostrate on his sickbed.