The Wars of the Roses - Alison Weir [243]
All sources agree that Warwick had the larger army, and Warkworth says Edward knew he was outnumbered. Warkworth estimated Warwick’s force at 20,000, while the Arrivall claimed he had 30,000 men. Most sources agree that the King had between 9000 and 10,000 men. The King himself commanded the Yorkist centre, Gloucester the right wing and Hastings the left. Montague, who had joined up with Warwick on the road south, led the Lancastrian centre, which straddled the road from St Albans to Barnet; Exeter commanded the left wing, which was drawn up on soft, marshy ground and consisted partly of cavalry, while Oxford commanded the right wing, which was stationed to the west of the road behind a hedge. Warwick placed himself in command of the reserve, which was well-armed with the newly invented handguns, and was drawn up where the present monument to the battle – erected in 1740 – stands on Hadley Green, north of Barnet. Both armies consisted mainly of foot soldiers, and both had guns and ordnance, although Warwick was better provided with the latter. Henry VI was held in custody behind the lines with the Yorkist reserve.
That evening, as the armies prepared to do battle, the fleet carrying Queen Margaret and her company landed at Weymouth in Dorset. The Queen had endured the most appalling voyage, having been at sea for twenty days ‘for lack of good winds and because of great tempests at sea’. Nevertheless, she remained undaunted, hoping to raise the south-west to the cause of Lancaster. This was no vain hope, for many of her chief adherents held lands and exercised political influence in the region, among them Somerset, Exeter, Devon, and Clarence, of whose defection she knew nothing.
What Margaret did not realise was that the readeption government was already thoroughly discredited as a result of Warwick’s unpopular foreign policy, and that she had arrived weeks too late to undo the damage. Nor did she know that Henry VI had again been overthrown by Edward IV. ‘I trow’, wrote a Paston correspondent, on learning of the Queen’s arrival, ‘that tomorrow, or else the next day, King Edward will depart from hence to her-ward to drive her out again.’
Early the next morning, which was Easter Sunday, between four and five o’clock, the King, knowing that day was approaching and, says the Arrivall, ‘notwithstanding that there was a dense mist which prevented them from seeing each other’, fell on his knees before his alerted army and ‘committed his cause to Almighty God’. He then ‘advanced banners, blew the trumpets and set upon [the enemy], at first with shot; very soon they joined and came to hand strokes, wherein his enemies manfully and courageously received them. With the faithful and mighty assistance of his supporters, who did not desert him and were as devoted to him as they possibly could be, King Edward vigorously, manfully and valiantly assailed his enemies in the centre and strongest part of their army, and with great violence.’
The King ‘beat and bore down’ all before him that stood in his way, ‘so that nothing might stand in the sight of him and the well-assured fellowship that attended truly upon him’ Soon, both sides sent in their reserves to reinforce the embattled centres. The two left wings gave way early on, but because of the mist neither Edward nor Warwick was aware that this had happened, each believing his own side to be winning. Oxford chased the Yorkist left wing for several miles through and beyond Barnet, while Gloucester charged through a deep depression called Dead Man’s Bottom into the centre of the confused Lancastrian left wing, where King Edward, leading the Yorkist centre, was already using his battle axe to deadly effect. As Exeter wheeled round to join Warwick for an assault on Gloucester, Montague swung round also.
Meanwhile, some of Oxford’s men had disappeared during the pursuit of the Yorkists; others took the opportunity to do a little pillaging in Barnet, and the Earl had