The Chronicle of Finistere

The year is 1524 and King James III sits on the throne of Bosworth in Shrewsbury. The people of his realm have prospered on agriculture and trade from the south resulting in a large population increase and huge national wealth. Market towns such as Shenton have sprung up in even the most distant regions of Bosworth, settlements characterised by grand buildings and a hard working population. However these developments haven’t gone unnoticed by nearby nations and in the neighbouring Kingdom of Finistere jealousy is brewing amongst the Royal court. The sprawling realm of Finistere stretched from the borders of Bosworth out towards the unknown east where it was rumoured a great unknown ocean lay, although in Bosworth this was largely dismissed as speculation.

The leader of Finistere, King Charles IV, resented what he saw as the selfish flourishing of Bosworth and so made the decision to enact revenge upon his neighbours. With this in mind he rallied his army to him at his capital of Saint Rénan from whence he intended to launch raids to capture some of the wealth of his rival King James. And so when the next moonlit night occurred towards midsummer King Charles set out through the high gates of Saint Rénan, the citizens of the city had turned out to watch their leader off and so a crowd of hundreds cheered as the mailed army who appeared to glow blue as the moonlight glinted off the cold steel of their armour. Charles’ personal troop of crossbowmen and men-at-arms wore surcoats of ermine which closely resembled the ermine flag of Finistere.

The majority of the army, including the crossbowmen, were mounted during transit and so the army made swift progress along the tracks which bordered the small fields and meadows which characterised the region under the star-peppered sky. However, the large blue glowing mass did not go unnoticed by Bosworth’s scouts who had expected such a move: knowing Finistere was far more likely to blame a foreign power for their failure rather than their own idleness. The scout who eventually came upon King Charles army was Frances of Isle St Jean, who at 20 was fortunately physically fit, and so he made his way to Shrewsbury with all haste. Frances was an archer, lightly armoured and armed with an English war bow which was slung over his shoulder as he rode through the darkened wilderness which ran the length of the international border.

The first beams of morning sunlight were beginning to fall on the many stone spires of Shrewsbury when Frances of Isle St Jean’s horse thundered through the recently opened city gates and up towards the city barracks. Civilians jumped aside and shouted angrily as the horse galloped through the narrow stone streets of the thatched city, however Frances knew he didn’t have time to waste and so he continued with all haste towards the centre of the city. Eventually he dismounted in the courtyard of his home stables to be greeted by an ironic cheer from his comrades who had all arrived back on time the previous evening. However Frances had seen the dust that was being produced by King Charles army and so had gone further into Finistere than planned to investigate further.

Many of the other archers were walking the halls of the barracks with blurry eyes and pounding heads as Frances entered and rushed through stone floored corridors to the lodgings of Monsieur Lois Montfort: the leader of Frances’ band of archers and men-at-arms who had received their King’s summons and so flocked from Gascony to their national capital. Frances burst into Lois’ quarters without knocking and so found his captain, the balding 45 year old Lois Montfort, with a spoonful of lumpy porridge halfway to his mouth and seemingly more grumpy in the morning than usual (although Frances had thought it impossible.)

At twenty and having been training in archery for sixteen years Frances was well built, reasonably tall and with light blonde hair which he kept raggedly short to avoid the trouble of maintaining it. On this summer morning Frances halted in the doorway of his captains lodgings in his armour and blue surcoat bearing a golden Fleur-de-lis. After a few seconds Lois asked “Well? What is it lad?” Frances quickly remembered why he was there and reported “King Charles’ army, it’s making for the border. I saw it with my own two eyes, Lois.” Montfort calmly eat his remaining porridge with an air of mild annoyance before strolling over to Frances, pushing him gently aside, before yelling “Alarm! To arms!” Out of the open door where it rang down the halls of the barracks bringing the hung-over men suddenly back to reality.

Soon the church bells of Shrewsbury were clanging and their racket reverberated along the narrow stone streets and sent hundreds of startled birds climbing into the sky from the roofs of the city. The streets thronged with soldiers making their way down from the castle which perched on a rocky outcrop in the city centre, to the main gates in the looming stone walls and out onto the plains beyond. King James himself rode out of the city in black armour atop a white destrier, his visor down and his helmet ringed with a narrow gold band which seemed to glow in the mid-morning sunshine. Rapturous cheers greeted the monarch from the various bands who made up his army, thousands of men-at-arms and even more archers were crowded onto the meadows which lay in the shadows of the many turrets which overlooked the walls and offered vantage points for the city’s garrison in case of an attack from one of Bosworth’s enemies.

Frances of Isle St Jean sat atop his grey mare and waited amongst Lois Montfort’s other archers for the off, the army was formed into three battle lines and most were eager for the off as many of them nursed a rare hatred of Finistere which led to much enthusiasm when news of the impending conflict reached them. Eventually King James rode between the battles with his grand banner of the Fleur-de-lis and lions towards the eastward sun surrounded by his entourage of knights and other noblemen. The army followed and as morning progressed into afternoon the army of Bosworth made good progress over the smooth eastern counties towards what they had rightly thought to be Charles’ target: Denton-Upon-Trent. The town of Denton had grown rich on the wool trade and, due to its very nature of being an insignificant market town, was poorly defended. Both Charles and John knew this so the race was on to arrive at the town first for the great clash of the Fleur-de-lis and lions of Bosworth with the tricolour of Finistere.

As it happened both men reached Denton within a few hours of each other and found something neither of them had expected: seemingly the town was not taken by surprise in the least and, judging by the primitive wooden palisades the townsfolk had erected, they had in fact had several days notice. However Charles knew he couldn’t even think about assaulting these primitive defences until he had disposed of his rival’s army which had drawn up on the opposite side of a plain: a solid wall of grey in the afternoon light. However Charles knew he had the advantage of a superior number of mounted knights and so, after some debate with his captains, drew up his horsemen in a vast line of attack facing across the grassland which was the ideal territory for horsemen.

Frances too knew that the advantage lay with his enemy and so prayed to God and St Jean that he would see out this day, he crossed himself and watched as the enemy knights came on. Knee to Knee with lances lowered the riders charged, bringing their horses up to a canter as they saw that only a thin line of men at arms stood between them and the hated Bosworth archers beyond. Knights particularly loathed the archers as their arrows could rip through horses and even plate armour and had effectively eliminated the use of cavalry from warfare, however today the conditions were ideal and it was time for revenge. Frances muttered a silent prayer as he removed 13 arrows from his bag, “One for each of the apostles and one for God” he thought. The archers of Bosworth all carried their arrows in bags with a draw string, as when a quiver is used the arrows might fall out when the archer runs and so leave him defenceless other than any minor secondary weapon he might have. The enemy knights straightened their line, sped up to a gallop and choose their targets, many of them aiming for the enemy King’s banner in the hope of capturing him and ransoming him back later on as was the tradition of such battles. However barely a hundred meters from Bosworth’s army’s front line something miraculous began to happen: the enemy horses began to trip and fall in unison.

Knights were thrown from the saddle and a pile of squealing destriers developed without as much as a stone being thrown in Bosworth’s defence. Frances saw a knight flailing on the floor in his heavy armour, causing a heron to take flight. “My God! It’s a marsh!” Frances exclaimed as the reason for the disturbance became clear. Now was the archer’s time, and without instructions or orders the hundreds of men with tall war bows ran forward to beyond their shield wall and once within range they drew back their bows to their ears and loosed.

Frances was amongst to release his arrow and he watched as hundreds of white fledged arrows arced into the sky, his second arrows was loosed before the first hit its mark and so he continued to loose his arrows into the mass of panicked enemies. Horses squealed and knights shouted as the arrows thudded through flesh and steel to leave a mangled mass where a proud group of knights had been moments before. Amongst the white fledged arrows smaller darker ones also flew into the dwindling ranks of Finistere’s horsemen, the townspeople of Denton had taken out their smaller hunting bows and contributed to the carnage in the marshes so that soon not a standing man or horse could be seen amongst the blood soaked pile from which so many arrows protruded.

At this point the archers knew the time for plundering had come and so, with their bows slung over their shoulders, drew knives and daggers and surged forward towards the doomed horsemen. Throats were cut, coins were stolen and fingers sliced off to remove rings in the chaos that followed in which the archers literally cut up their enemies in search of riches. Frances generally disagreed with the more extreme aspects of plundering and so only took a small helmet and a falchion from the abundant loot which lay around him. Priests mingled amongst the dead blessing their souls and trying to calm the worst of the looting, however they were fighting a losing battle. As his archers ravaged their fallen foes King James knew this struggle was not yet over, King Charles with his crossbowmen and personal guard were still on the field so they day was not yet won. With this in mind he ordered his men-at-arms to dismount and wade through the bog to engage his rival on the other side, which they grudgingly began to do. Some of the archers who had tired of the plundering also went with the knights in an attempt to finish things off while the opportunity was there, Frances was amongst them. In his hand Frances held his newly acquired falchion, a sword with a blade as broad as an axe and with lethal cutting power.

King Charles drew his crossbowmen up in a line with one end facing the newly constructed town walls of Denton; he hoped his bowmen could cut down the enemy before they reached their own lines. Crossbows had a shorter range and smaller rate of fire than the large bows carried by Bosworth’s archers, however as any Bosworthian could have told then: the reason Finistere’s men couldn’t fire the large bows was that they didn’t begin training soon enough. A son would have to be started with archery training at six years old at the latest to grow into the broad-shouldered form of a longbow man, which the citizens of Finistere were seemingly unaware of.

However most of Bosworth’s archers were still in the marsh and so the slow moving men-at-arms were still in grave danger from the stubby iron arrows which whistled through the air before thumping through plate and mail. Charles estimated his men would have time to loose two volleys before the men-at-arms could reach his lines: plenty enough he thought to make up for the earlier disaster which he knew was caused by his over-confidence. As the enemy advanced the crossbowmen loosed for the first time and their bolts thudded through armour and flesh causing masses of men-at-arms to fall to the ground: dead. Frances survived the first volley although he was less confident of repeating it, however as the crossbowmen struggled to draw back their taut bow strings the tide once more turned in Bosworth’s favour.

As the first volley of bolts whipped into Bosworth’s men at arms the forgotten ramshackle garrison of Denton flooded out of the low gates behind the enemy lines and swarmed over Charles’ crossbow men with knives, hoes and any other sharp objects they could get their hands on. This distraction bought some precious time for Bosworth’s men at arms who completed their charge and hit into Finistere’s crossbow men like a great wave. Frances of Isle St Jean, due to not being weighed down with heavy armour, was one of the first to reach the enemy and swung his falchion down on one of the crossbow men in a great arc which almost severed the man’s head before moving on to the next foe. Rapidly the mix of soldiers and civilians closed in on the tricolour of Finistere’s King and this was when Frances met his first real opposition: a knight of the enemy King.

The knight was heavily armoured however he had lost his shield in a previous skirmish and so was somewhat less well protected than he had been moments before, however he was still better equipped than Frances whom he swung at with a huge mace which skimmed the side of Frances’ body and slammed into the earth with a thud. As his enemy struggled to regain his weapon Frances instinctively swung his Falchion upwards into the weak armour around the man’s groin, the knight howled in pain as the weapon struck him. Frances then began to kick the bottom of the blade upwards with snarls of “Bastard” as he did so; the falchion soon broke through steel and bone and left the knight bleeding heavily on the blood slickened grass.

Frances yanked his weapon loose, raised its blood soaked blade to the sky and gave the war cry of Bosworth: “St Edmund!” Others joined in the cheer as the last of the enemy King’s guards crumbled and his banner fell to be trodden into the earth by the advancing hoard. Soon Charles was unhorsed and defenceless on the grass surrounded by enemies, his army was destroyed and his country bankrupted by the war which he had hoped would bring such huge riches. However he would not be allowed the peace of death, he was taken to captivity in Shrewsbury and Finistere was at the mercy of Bosworth.