The Battle of Shrewsbury 1403

The Battle was the culmination of a rebellion led by Henry Percy (also known as Harry Hotspur), which had hoped to remove the unpopular King Henry IV from the throne.

The Battle was important as not only was it fought to determine who would rule England but it was also the first time that English bowmen had faced each other on the field of battle.

Other important men involved included Owain Glyndwr, Richard II and Harry Prince of Wales, who was son of Henry IV and later became Henry V.

Richard II was angry with his cousin Henry IV (also known as Henry Bolingbroke) as he had deposed Richard from the throne 4 years earlier. This act also made other enemies for Henry as although Richard was not a popular king Henry’s actions were not popular either.

The Percys were the most important landowners in England. The Percys had actually helped Henry to depose Richard and were well rewarded with lands and offices. Harry Hotspur was put in charge of North Wales and Cheshire.

However, relations between Henry IV and the Percys were soon to turn sour. Hotspur was related to the Mortimer family by marriage and because of this he felt he had a stronger claim to the throne than the king. The Percys also said that Henry had promised he would not take the throne upon the removal of Richard II and that he would allow Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, to become king.

The Percys, with Hotspur in charge, had also had an impressive victory over the Scots at Homildon Hill in 1402 but Henry IV had failed to cover their war expenses as promised and he fell out of favour with them and Hotspur decided to make a claim for the throne.

In July 1403 Hotspur gathered together an army of 200 men including his uncle the Earl of Worcester and the Earl of Douglas. Hotspur’s troops headed for Cheshire, which was where Richard II’s fearsome bodyguard the Cheshire Archers came from. It was also the only area that had attempted to resist the takeover by Henry IV.

Chester provided most of Hotspur’s troops and leaders but others joined the cause from Shropshire, Herefordshire, Flintshire, Lancashire, Yorkshire and Northumberland.

Henry was in Nottingham on his way to help the Percys against the Scots when he heard about the rebellion.

The Percys and their supporters gathered at Sandiway in Cheshire on the 17th July and under the banner of Richard II’s White Hart they marched south through Whitchurch and on to Shrewsbury.

Shrewsbury was held by Harry, Prince of Wales and Hotspur and Henry IV both arrived in the town on the 19th or 20th July. Hotspur, seeing that the enemy held Shrewsbury, retreated to Berwick, near a ford on the River Severn. Hotspur had hoped to have Owain Glyndwr and his troops join them at Shrewsbury but the arrival of Prince Harry in the town had prevented this.

In the evening of the 19th July Henry’s men forded the River Severn at Uffington and camped the night at Haughmond Abbey.

Harry Hotspur and the Earls of Worcester and Douglas all had more experience of battle than King Henry, but they outnumbered his troops. Estimates put the number of rebels at 5-7,000 compared to 10,000 men on the royalist side. Hotspur had been hoping the Welsh Prince Owain Glyndwr would had brought more men along, but as yet he hadn’t arrived.

The exact site of the battlefield has not been identified but most accounts have the armies facing each other at a right angle to the A49, with Battlefield Church in the middle.

With his smaller army Hotspur would be forced to fight defensively and it is most likely that he chose a nearby ridge as a vantage point. The royalist troops formed up 500 yards away, out of the firing range of the archers.

At the front of each army would have been the archers, with the foot soldiers, armed with swords, crossbows and other weapons, behind.

By lunchtime the two sides were ready and the abbots of Shrewsbury and Haughmond Abbeys arrived to try and mediate between the two enemy leaders. Henry apparently offered very generous surrender terms to the rebels, an offer which caused one of the rebel leaders and his troops to switch sides. However, the rebels weren’t willing to accept them and Henry wasn’t willing to offer anything more.

Henry believed that Hotspur was trying to delay the battle in the hope that Owain Glyndwr would arrive with extra forces. Henry finally ordered his men to advance just a few hours before sunset.

As the royalists advanced the Cheshire Archers at the front of the rebel formation began to fire on them. The average archer could fire about ten arrows per minute and it is thought that Hotspur may have had as many as 3,000 archers.

Prince Harry was hit in the face by an arrow but he continued fighting. The royalists caused little damage to the rebels and soon began to fall back. Hotspur saw this retreat and gathered together his best men to make an attack on the king. However, during the fighting Hotspur was killed.

This spurred Prince Harry on to attack the right side and rear of the rebel army, who on the news of Hotspur’s death panicked, broke ranks and fled with the king’s men in pursuit. The fleeing troops were cut down mercilessly.