The crown was at stake when, on a late winter day in 1461, two rival armies clashed in the bloodies battle on English soil.
England’s Wars of the Roses were two struggles in one. The first was a feud between the houses of Lancaster (symbolized by a red rose), with King Henry VI at its head, and York (a white rose), led by Richard of York. Both sides were directly descended from Edward III, with Henry having the better claim to the throne. But Henry was an infant who—unlike his father, the great warrior Henry V—grew to be weak, indecisive, overly pious and unstable. Given the ambitions of the men surrounding his throne, Henry’s personal disadvantages constituted a recipe for political disaster. The conflict was also a civil war between the north of England, under Lancastrian control (ironically with the city of York as its power base), and the south, under Yorkist control from London.
In 1460, after more than five years of fighting, the wars appeared to be over. Lancastrian forces had killed Richard of York at the Battle of Wakefield and mounted his head on a gatehouse spike at York. They had also defeated York’s staunchest supporter, Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick (the “Kingmaker”), sending him into retreat. But on the verge of total victory, Henry and his commanders lost their nerve and failed to occupy London. With Richard’s vengeful and militarily competent son Edward marching hard from his victories in the West, the Lancastrians retreated to their northern strongholds. Edward linked up with Warwick, entered London and was declared king. But with Henry VI still claiming to rule England from York, Edward’s hold on the crown was shaky; he believed he needed a sign from God to secure his claim to the throne. So he postponed his coronation, recruited a new army and prepared to march north to do battle with the Lancastrians and receive God’s blessing.
In the cold dawn of a late March day in 1461 the Lancastrian John Clifford, 9th Lord of Skipton, and 500 hardened light infantrymen known as the “Flower of Craven” swept into a Yorkist encampment near Ferrybridge, Yorkshire. The surprised defenders had been repairing a stone bridge across the Aire River and managed only feeble resistance. Their commander, Lord Fitzwalter, Warwick’s illegitimate brother, interpreted the sounds of fighting as a brawl among his own unruly men and went to settle matters. Leaving his tent in only a nightshirt, he was immediately felled by a vicious blow to the head.
Warwick, also hearing the commotion, rode forward with a small band of reinforcements but soon took an arrow to the leg. He and the other survivors quickly retreated to the fortress of Pontefract, where Edward waited with the bulk of the Yorkist army. Warwick told the king the bridge was lost and the Lancastrians were close at hand. Legend has it that Warwick then turned, sword in hand, and killed his horse. To the assembled army he shouted, “Let him fly that will, for surely I will tarry with him that will tarry with me.” If true, Edward’s hardened warriors, noting that Warwick was fresh from fleeing one small fight, were likely unimpressed by his theatrics.
Edward, then just 18, was not given to panic. After conferring with his commanders, he ordered his army to march for Ferrybridge. Simultaneously, he sent heavy cavalry under Warwick’s uncle, William Neville, Lord Fauconberg, several miles downriver to cross the Aire at Castleford. As Edward’s vanguard approached Ferrybridge it launched an immediate assault, hoping to brush aside the Flower of Craven. Clifford’s men were well positioned and supported by archers, however, and virtually every Lancastrian arrow struck home with deadly effect. Only after Edward brought up his own archers were his men able to force a crossing. Still, Clifford’s troops gave ground grudgingly, and Edward’s losses mounted. He eventually got his own archers forward, and his overwhelming numbers began to tell. Clifford, after holding the bridge for most of the day, finally retreated. But he had tarried too long.
Fauconberg, who according to Edward Hall’s 1542 Chronicle was “a man of great policy and of much experience in martial feats,” had already crossed the Aire and was headed for Clifford’s rear. The men of the Flower of Craven were forced into a life-or-death race to reach the Lancastrian army before they were cut off. They lost. Fauconberg’s men intercepted and annihilated them just a mile short of Henry’s Lancastrian encampment. The “Butcher Clifford” (who a few months earlier had stabbed Edward’s 17-year-old brother to death after the Battle of Wakefield) took an arrow to the throat. The Yorkists beheaded his corpse and threw it into a pit.
That action had barely ended when Edward’s vanguard approached the field. Edward himself was now in the lead, his Black Bull standard flying. He marched the bulk of his army through the battle site, stopping in the fields surrounding the village of Saxton to wait for stragglers. He would need every man, for the Lancastrian army was then settling on Towton plain, just a mile to the north.
Edward had a larger concern. The ailing John de Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk and commander of the Yorkist army’s rear formation, had been late to march and was advancing slowly. Edward could not be certain that Norfolk, with over a quarter of the army, would arrive in time for the battle. Edward knew Norfolk’s support of the Yorkist cause had always been lukewarm, and given the ever-shifting alliances in the Wars of the Roses, he likely suspected treachery. But Norfolk remained loyal, and his arrival on the battlefield proved decisive. In retrospect, Clifford’s valiant holding action at Ferrybridge had proved—ironically— a strategic error; the delay postponed the great battle a day and gave Norfolk time to catch up with the rest of the Yorkists.
Edward spent that night in Saxton’s meager lodgings, while his troops, sleeping under the stars, endured snow and ice with little to eat. Just to the north the Lancastrian host was also suffering through a freezing night, though their leaders in the well-appointed town of Towton were considerably more comfortable than Edward and his retinue.
Leading the Lancastrians in Henry’s stead was 24-year-old Henry Beaufort, 3rd Duke of Somerset. Despite his youth he was experienced in war and had played a major role in the previous Lancastrian victories at Wakefield (1460) and Second St. Albans (1461). His top lieutenants included Henry Percy, 3rd Earl of Northumberland, who bore a special hatred for Warwick, and Sir Andrew Trollope, an excellent soldier who had recently deserted the Yorkist cause in favor of Henry.
Henry himself awaited word of events in York, just 12 miles north of Towton. Despite his shortcomings, Henry was still considered God’s anointed ruler of England and commanded widespread loyalty. Edward, on the other hand, was something of a usurper, claiming the crown only because his army and the people of London believed him the rightful ruler. Edward meant to demonstrate God’s approval of his rule by destroying Henry’s army and capturing York. Given that the Lancastrian army was probably a third larger than the Yorkist force, Edward faced a formidable challenge.
Early on the morning of March 29, Palm Sunday, thousands of men on both sides began to stir. Food was short, but wine and ale plentiful. Men drank eagerly, for warmth and perhaps an additional measure of courage. No one knows exactly how many men fought at Towton, but nearly every major lord in England (19 Lancastrians and nine Yorkists) was present with his retinue. Moreover, as each side regarded this as the decisive battle, both had made all-out recruiting efforts. Based on what is known of the battle, 60,000 men is a prudent estimate of the total forces engaged, making Towton the largest battle ever fought on English soil.
Somerset’s Lancastrians were well situated on a plateau south of Towton, forcing Edward’s army to attack uphill against a larger force. To the Lancastrians’ rear and on their right flank lay the narrow—but deep and fast-flowing—River Cock Beck. Marshes protected their left flank. Somerset had positioned his army with the van, main and rear formations one behind the other, with most of the archers up front. It is likely that Somerset, Northumberland and Trollope began the battle in the front ranks to inspire their men. Their force was in disarray on the morning of the battle, and according to Polydore Vergil—King Henry VIII’s court chronicler—they just managed to get into position when the Yorkists appeared.
In battle formation the Yorkists approached the killing ground at about 9 a.m., cresting Towton ridge just minutes after leaving Saxton. Edward’s men approached with Fauconberg and 10,000 archers in the van, followed by Warwick, commanding the second rank of men-atarms, and Edward, either in the third rank or with a mounted reserve in the rear.
Fauconberg realized the weather had given the Yorkists a momentary advantage: A powerful wind drove heavy snow directly into the faces of the Lancastrian archers, shortening their range and making it difficult for them to judge the effects of their fire. Fauconberg ordered each of his own archers to fire a single arrow. The 10,000 deadly shafts flew off with the wind.
The sudden missile strike had the effect on the Lancastrians that Fauconberg hoped for. Unable to see the Yorkist archers through the snow, but believing they must be in range, the Lancastrians fired hundreds of thousands of arrows at their hated enemies over the next 10 minutes. The blizzard raged on, and most of their arrows fell a full 40 yards short of Fauconberg’s archer line. Once the Lancastrians had emptied their quivers, Fauconberg ordered his archers to advance to the line of spent arrows. On his command the Yorkists let fly. But this time they drew second, third and fourth arrows, until each archer had expended the 48 shafts he’d brought to the field. Then they picked up the spent Lancastrian arrows and fired those back at their original owners.
The Lancastrians stood on the receiving end of possibly the most terrible “arrow storm” ever delivered on a medieval battlefield. In less than 10 minutes up to 750,000 shafts struck home in a box about 1,000 yards long and 500 yards wide, which averages out to 1.5 arrows for every square yard of the Lancastrian position. While a few of the Lancastrians wore plate armor, the effects on the lightly protected men-at-arms was surely devastating. No chronicle specifies how many casualties the Yorkist archers inflicted on the Lancastrians, but it must have been in the thousands.
Realizing their troops could not withstand that arrow storm much longer, the Lancastrian commanders ordered an advance, and Somerset’s veterans stepped off. Just 400 yards lay between them and the Yorkist lines, but progress was slow as they pushed through the driving snowstorm, their own dead and wounded, and the thicket of spent arrows. The Yorkist archers fired one last volley and then fell back through their own line. They had done their work with brutal efficiency and could rest until the final stage of the battle.
Despite their losses during the arrow storm, the Lancastrians still outnumbered the Yorkists and were likely better rested and fed. Clearing the arrow line, they picked up speed and, closing rapidly with their despised foes, took up the cry, “King Henry! King Henry!” The Lancastrians tried to break the enemy line, but the seasoned Yorkist fighters held their positions. Determined attackers met equally stubborn defenders. All knew this was a battle without quarter—none asked, none given. As Hall’s Chronicle relates: “The battle was sore fought, for hope of life was set aside on every part, and taking of prisoners was proclaimed as a great offense, by reason whereof every man determined to conquer or die in the field.”
The battle was long and fierce. Eventually, Lancastrian numbers began to tell, and the Yorkist line was forced inward. At that point Edward proved his value as a warrior and leader. Throughout the fight he rode behind the combat line shouting encouragement, and where Edward saw his men giving way, he dismounted and threw himself into the fray. In full armor and standing well over 6 feet tall, Edward was by all accounts an inspiring figure. He was blessed with unusual strength, and the Lancastrians felt his impact wherever he entered the battle. Edward was able to hold his line against the stronger Lancastrian force— but just barely.
In hours of fighting neither side moved the other. Along the battle line bodies piled up. Several chronicles report that periodically the combatants declared local truces in order to move bodies to the rear. Then the killing resumed, free of obstructions. As the battle wore on, the Lancastrians managed to slip some of their men around the Yorkist left flank. Yorkist cavalry reportedly tried to hold back the flank attack but were routed by a Lancastrian countercharge. The situation was desperate when Edward, at the head of his meager reserves, again charged into the fray. His actions were effective—but only briefly. The superior Lancastrian force slowly pushed back the Yorkist line.
Suddenly, Norfolk’s tardy forces, now commanded by Sir John Howard, arrived on the battlefield. Approaching up the Old London Road, Norfolk’s 5,000 veterans remained hidden from view until they crested the ridge on the Lancastrian left flank. Attacking straight from the march, the Yorkist reinforcements crushed the enemy flank and began rolling up the Lancastrian line. Northumberland fell while trying to rally the retreating Lancastrians, and the once-imminent Lancastrian victory evaporated. Somerset, seeing the unfolding crisis, called for his horse and headed for the endangered left flank. But upon viewing huge numbers of fresh Yorkists rushing forward, he thought better of his actions and with a few horsemen he removed himself “a little out of that place.” Seeing the banners of their leaders down or departing, the Lancastrian rank and file broke and ran. Then the real slaughter began.
The Yorkists surged forward. Knights and many of the men-at-arms rushed for their horses in order to run down the fleeing Lancastrians. Behind the mounted men the lightly armored archers joined in the pursuit. In swarms they knocked men to the ground and finished them off with daggers through armor joints or through visor slits into staring eyes.
The luckless Lancastrian right flank retreated across the bloody meadow, only to be trapped against the rushing Cock Beck. Although Edward had told his men that in the event of victory they were to kill the lords and spare the commoners, his orders fell on deaf ears. There were old scores to settle and plunder to be had. Moreover, as the battle had been fought without quarter, none would be given in victory. The disorganized mass of Lancastrians, herded up against the river, made easy targets for the Yorkist archers and heavy cavalry. Some desperate men took their chances in the fast-flowing Cock Beck—and many drowned. Hall recounts that the river ran red with blood and was clogged with so many dead at one point that some Lancastrians made their escape over a “bridge of bodies.”
The carnage was much the same on the other flank. Some well-mounted nobles, including Somerset, escaped to York. Somerset stopped there just long enough to inform King Henry and Queen Margaret of the disaster and urge them to flee to Scotland—advice they were quick to take. Other battlefield refugees threw off helmets and armor as they fled, only to make themselves easy targets for their mounted pursuers. The fields between Towton and Tadcaster, a few miles to the north, became a vast killing ground. Those Lancastrians who persisted soon faced a fresh obstacle— the River Wharfe. When the foot soldiers arrived on its banks, they found the only bridge already destroyed, likely by Somerset’s own mounted knights, hoping to forestall the Yorkist pursuit. But in so doing, they ensured the slaughter of their own infantry. The Croyland Chronicle recounts that the Yorkists hounded the Lancastrians for 10 miles, to the very gates of York itself.
The day after the battle Edward entered York, though too late to capture Henry. His first act was to order the removal of his father’s and brother’s heads from the spikes over Micklegate Bar. The Yorkists soon replaced them with other heads, as Edward’s second act was to preside over the quick trials and executions of 42 captured knights.
It must have seemed the judgment of God was clear. Edward was now the rightful king of England, and he reigned uninterrupted for a decade. However, when Warwick revolted—evidently slighted at not receiving sufficient reward for his role as “Kingmaker,” Edward was forced to flee. He soon returned, however, and won the crown from Henry a second time at the Battles of Barnet and Tewkesbury in 1471. His brother Richard III, however, lost the throne in 1485 on Bosworth Field to the upstart House of Tudor. Illness had claimed Edward’s life two years before.
For further reading Jim Lacey recommends Towton: The Battle of Palm Sunday Field, by John Sadler, and Towton: The Bloodiest Battle, by A.W. Boardman.
Originally published in the March 2012 issue of Military History. To subscribe, click here.
