[Norman Conquest 01] Wolves in Armour (4 page)

Sunrise was a little after 6.00am and the rising sun revealed them to be several miles from land, with Beachy Head off to the left. The ship was surrounded by a veritable forest of masts and sails all heading north, most apparently setting a course for Pevensey. High tide was due about noon and the tidal ebb of both Pevensey and Bulverhythe harbours dictated a quick disembarkation if ships were not to be swept back out to sea by the ebb of the tide. A few of the ships entered the harbour itself; most simply drew up and beached themselves bow-first at low water on the shingle beach or the mudflats to the east, disembarking as quickly as possible and then using the incoming tide to refloat and proceed back to sea.

With so many ships arriving almost at the same time, Alan’s boat had to wait for a patch of shingle beach to become free before the captain carefully manoeuvred between other boats and gently ran bow-forward onto the beach. The men-at-arms aboard disembarked immediately, jumping over the bow of the boat into the thigh-deep water and splashed their way ashore, leaving the knights and their retainers to unload the horses.

Unloading the horses was no easy task. Waves three feet high were rolling from astern, causing the ship to rise and fall and its bottom to thump onto the hard-packed stones of the beach. The planks that were placed amidships for the horses to walk down were repeatedly dislodged by the waves. With the typical perversity of their kind, several of the horses now decided that they didn’t want to leave their stalls. The captain and crew, standing back and providing no assistance, repeatedly shouted abuse and instructed the knights to, “Get the damn nags off this ship before we spring a plank. If you don’t do it quick, I’ll cut their damn throats and throw them overboard.” Robert detailed a man with drawn sword to detain the crew near the steering oar, and a blow to the mouth stopped the captain’s stream of abuse.

Eventually all six horses were coaxed down the narrow plank walkway, most with a blanket over their heads to prevent them being frightened and unmanageable. The sea where the horses were being unloaded was chest-deep and nearly an hour passed before the last horse was led wet and shivering up the beach.

All around them was a scene of total confusion. Men were struggling onboard ships; men were struggling though the water and men milling about on the beach with no idea of what to do. Horses stood on the beach and in groups closer to the town. Hundreds of ships were drawn up on the beach, with their sterns still in the water. Dozens of ships had lost control, some crashing into and running afoul of other ships, locked together. Others were side-on to the waves and rolling viciously as the waves pounded them against the stony beach. Those ships that had unloaded were struggling to get off the beach and get a reasonable distance off-shore- which was no easy task when they were on a lee-shore with the wind trying to blow them back to the beach.

Fortunately there was no interference from the English navy. Even a dozen Saxon longboats, propelled by oars, would have wreaked devastation amongst the invasion fleet. There was also no sign of the English army; again even a small force would have been able to have mounted an effective defence against the disorganized rabble who were landing. Alan was please to find that the rumours of the English fleet and the native militia fyrd being dispersed because of the lateness of the season appeared to be accurate. After all, nobody in their right mind would start an invasion in late September.

By God’s good grace the Normans and their allies had received the one day of good weather and southerly winds that the expedition had required, and their leaders had held the army together long enough to make a crossing almost impossibly late in the season.

The few residents of Pevensey, a small town little more than a village, did their best to make themselves invisible.

The next day was 29th September- Michaelmas, the feast of St Michael. There was little in the way of feasting, although most of the contingent still had a few supplies that they had brought with them. Almost the whole army attended a series of outdoor Masses held that day- there was no shortage of Bishops and their entourages, as many had contributed armed forces towards the army.

Several days were spent by the men raising an earthen motte and erecting a castle by installing prefabricated wooden sections that had been brought to make the walls and keep. The tents of the army were erected on the high ground to the west of the town.

It was soon clear that the choice of landing place had been a poor one. Marshes dominated the landscape to the north and east. There was no usable road and the army stripped the countryside bare of fresh food within days. Perishable food had not been brought with the supplies on the ships, which were limited mainly to sacks of dried peas and beans, root vegetables, flour and oats- the latter for the horses.

Word passed around the army that they were to move further east along the coast to Hastings. While Hastings was only ten miles away ‘as the crow flies’, the journey would entail thirty miles of difficult slogging across swamps, sluggish tidal rivers and around Bulverhythe harbour. The foot-soldiers were ferried by boat around the worst of the land and marched along the coast; the cavalry rode the long way around. Nobody wanted to load and unload horses from ships ever again.

Hallisham and Hooe were laid waste by the cavalry. Ninefield and Catsfield were badly damaged and stripped bare. On the more southerly route the foot-soldiers devastated the four villages in their path; Bexhill, Crowhurst, Wilting and Filsham. Leaving two paths of death and destruction behind it, the army entered the land at Hastings belonging to the Abbey of Fécamp. There William and much of his army took Mass on 1st October and then spent several days constructing another pre-fabricated fort.

Alan was less than happy with the actions of the army. He’d marched with most of the cavalry on the northern route to Hastings. The devastation that an army on the march wreaked was distasteful to him. Any army, even if on friendly soil and well managed, wrought devastation and pillage as it moved. In enemy territory, even if unresisting, the situation was worse. Alan was sick to the stomach of seeing burnt-out farms, the dead bodies of men whose only crime was to seek to protect what was theirs, and the violated and dead corpses of their womenfolk.

“I may be inexperienced, but I like not the actions of our men towards the local populace,” commented Alan as they rode through the burnt ruin of the village of Wilting. A few trees were decorated with the bodies of those soldiers caught in flagrant breach of the ban imposed by William on such activities, but this had done little to control the excesses of many in the army, particularly the mercenaries.

The equally inexperience Robert sighed his agreement, but Hugh replied, “Mercenaries and foot-soldiers fight in the expectation of loot to supplement their meagre pay.”

“That may well be the case, but at least one of those bodies swinging in the breeze wore a tunic of reasonable quality- I would guess that man to have been a knight, although now stripped of his armour and weapons. How much plunder do they expect to find in a poor village where the serfs scrape a bare existence from the soil?”

“Perhaps something of worth from the manor houses of the local thegns, perhaps a hoard of silver or some plate,” replied Hugh. “A substantial part of the problem is the lack of fresh provisions for the army. An army on friendly soil can expect to receive supplies either bought or requisitioned from the local villages, or brought in by wagon from further away. An army on the march in enemy territory is expected to feed itself as it moves, meaning that it had to constantly keep moving, emptying the countryside of food like a plague of locusts. An army in enemy territory that stands still is at a severe disadvantage. Apart from the strategic implications of a stationary army losing any advantage of manoeuvre, within days it cannot feed itself.”

While the move from Pevensey to Hastings was an improvement, a few hours on horseback showed Alan that the situation was still unsuitable for an army. Hastings was effectively a small triangle of land with Bulverhythe harbour to the west. To the east were the marshy valleys of the Bede and Rother rivers. To the north a track led through the Andreas Forest on the way to London, some sixty miles away.

Alternatively, a route east led across the Bede and Rother rivers and the coastal route to London via Dover. Both routes placed William’s army at a disadvantage due to the ground being unsuitable for cavalry. The area was heavily wooded and contained few villages and little food. Some ships arrived with food and provisions, but these were few and made little impact on the situation for an army that would soon be slowly starving.

Within a week the area had been ravaged of all food. There was scarcely a chicken or pig within five miles. Haystacks were carried off to feed the warhorses. What little money or loot was available had long gone- stolen by the soldiers or hidden by owners who had fled.

And still nothing was heard of the English or their army.

On 7th October a messenger rode in for Duke William from Robert fitzWymarc, a distant relative of the duke who had long lived in England after being given land by King Edward. FitzWymarc advised of Harold’s incredible march from London to York, his crushing victory over the Norwegians at Stamford Bridge and his rapid march back to London where both the professional troops who had been victorious at Stamford Bridge and the thegns and fyrd of East Anglia and Hertfordshire were being raised against William’s army- together with the men from Harold’s own lands of Kent, Middlesex and the lands of the West Saxons. Harold would soon possess an army of crushing strength.

“We can’t sit here, that’s for sure,” commented Alan on hearing this latest news. “Harold is coming, as we always knew he would. We’re penned up in a tiny pocket of land, where we’ll soon be starving. There’s no way we can winter here.”

“And Harold’s ships will soon be cutting off what little supplies and reinforcements we receive by sea,” agreed Robert morosely. “Why do you think that William has ordered a harrying of the land around here? It’s been stripped pretty bare anyway but that’s just what happens when you have a hungry army with time on its hands, particularly when at least a third of the men are mercenaries. Now he wants everything torching except the abbey’s lands.”

Alan shook his head in mystification. “Harold seems to be able to move his army fifty or sixty miles a day. If he was in London two days ago, he could be here today.”

“But not in force,” replied Robert. “The longer he waits the stronger he will be when he arrives.”

“What of the pope’s threat of excommunication to any who oppose William? What effect do you think that will have?” asked Alan.

Hugh de Berniers, who had been listening, laughed sardonically. “I think it’ll mean little to the English. If Harold wins and we’re defeated, I’m sure that Harold will convince the pope that it’s all a mistake and no sentence of excommunication should be proclaimed. If he loses this battle and there’s a prolonged campaign, perhaps it’ll affect the English morale in the long term. Don’t forget they’re fighting for their homes against us foreign invaders. What another foreigner, however influential, says is likely to be of little consequence to them. After all, ‘The Bastard’ was in trouble with Pope Leo over his marriage to Matilda and that didn’t prevent him from getting what he wanted eventually- it just took some time and cost a lot of money to bribe the pope. I understand the cost was the building and endowment of two new abbeys. Stigand, the Archbishop of Canterbury, has been under anathema of excommunication for years- excommunicated by five successive Popes, and both Edward the Confessor and Harold retained him in the most influential ecclesiastical position in the land for political reasons. To me that indicates the English pay scant attention to the interdictions issued by the Holy Fathers in Rome.”

“Anyway, who’s to say the English even know of the interdict?” commented Robert. “We received news only a few weeks ago and few ships will have been able to sail against the wind to England in that time. I’m more interested in how many of the English huscarles and thegns were killed or wounded at Fulford Gate and Stamford Bridge, and how many march against us. One thing is for certain, it’s been a difficult few weeks for Harold and the English.”

“How did the duke get Pope Alexander’s Blessing for the expedition?” queried Alan.

“Politics!” replied Hugh. “The pope is Italian. We Normans are very influential in Italy and Sicily these days. There are a lot of us down there- and no Englishmen! Alexander received the duke’s embassy and didn’t even bother to send for the English to hear their side of the argument. William claimed Harold is an adulterer and forsworn. If that’s the worst he could come up with then Harold must have led a fairly blameless life!

“What Bishop Lanfranc offered the pope was a chance to bring the English church to heel. It’s been quite independent, even having the scriptures translated into English and Mass spoken in the local language- which most churchmen find offensive. The churchmen of Normandy and France claim the English church is full of corruption, with offices bought and sold or given as bribes- the crime of simony. Considering the situation of Odo, the Duke William’s half-brother and now Bishop of Bayeux, the pope must have found it hard to control his mirth on hearing that argument! Odo was appointed as bishop when he was still a child, has no learning and no knowledge of the scriptures. How many bishops put on armour and ride into battle as part of their religious duties? Several of the Norman bishops do!