Battle of Losecote Field

Battle of Losecote Field

Part of: Wars of the Roses

date	March 12, 1470
place	Tickencote Warren , Rutland , England
output	Victory of the house of York

Parties to the conflict
York House	Lancaster house
Commander
Edward IV	Sir Robert Welles
Troop strength
unknown	30,000 men
losses
unknown	unknown

The Battle of Losecote Field was fought on March 12, 1470 as part of the Wars of the Roses . Opponents in this battle included royal troops under King Edward IV from the House of York on one side, and rebels from Lincolnshire with the assistance of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick , and George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence , the king's brother the other side. The battle ended with the victory of the royal army, the execution of the rebels and the flight from Warwick to France. The battle ended Warwick's attempts to place a king of the House of York he liked on the throne. Warwick joined his former enemy, Margaret of Anjou , and the House of Lancaster after losing the battle .

The Battle of Losecoat Field is also known as the Battle of Empingham or the Battle of Losecoat, Losecote and Loose-coat.

background

A year earlier, in July 1469, King Edward IV had been defeated at the Battle of Edgecote Moor by Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick. Warwick had thus temporarily achieved his goal of imprisoning the king and exerting greater influence on politics. Eduard was able to free himself from captivity and moved back to London. In March 1470, Warwick was in the same position as the year before the Battle of Edgecote Moor: he was unable to influence Edward's policies. Warwick therefore wanted to bring a brother of the king, George Plantagenet, the Duke of Clarence, to the throne of England, in order to position a king from the House of York who could be more easily influenced by him.

The opportunity for a coup d'état arose in 1470 when a feud broke out between Sir Thomas Burgh of Gainsborough and Robert Welles, a leading landowner in Lincolnshire . The family of Robert Welles then fell out of favor with Eduard, whereupon Robert Welles started a rebellion against the king. Welles began rallying an army in Lincolnshire ready to take up arms against the king. The unrest in Lincolnshire caused the king to react and began rallying men for his army on March 4th. The news that the king was about to march on Lincolnshire quickly spread among the people. Sir Robert found even more retinue after the spread of rumors that the King was coming to Lincolnshire to punish the previously pardoned Edgecote rebels and that he would "hang and stretch a great number of them."

Backed by Warwick and Clarence, Welles proclaimed himself the 'great captain' of the Lincolnshire people. On March 4th, scouts were sent to all the surrounding villages to get all sane men to follow him in rebellion against the king. On March 7, the king received disturbing news that the rebel army was marching on Stamford , with 100,000 men recruited from local counties, particularly Yorkshire . When Eduard heard that Warwick and Clarence were also moving towards Leicester, he probably concluded that they had allied themselves with Welles.

Edward had meanwhile called Lord Welles, Sir Robert's father, and Sir Thomas Dymoke to London. He forced Lord Welles to write to his son Robert and ask him to stop his rebellion, otherwise Lord Welles would be executed by the king. Welles then returned with his army to Stamford to attack the king's troops and save his father. Welles was unable to unite his troops with those of Warwick and Clarence who were in Leicester , which later turned out to be a strategic error.

battle

Edward's scouts informed him that the rebel army was about five miles from Stamford, near Empingham in Rutland. He sent an advance guard to seize their artillery. When a letter arrived from Warwick and Clarence announcing that they wanted to combine their troops with his troops in Leicester as "reinforcements" for Edward, Edward saw the trap and acted quickly: he had his troops march west to attack Sir Robert Welles to go into battle.

Before the battle began, Edward had Lord Welles executed in front of the troops and sent a herald to inform Sir Robert Welles of this and tell him to surrender and beg for mercy. Sir Robert Welles refused. Edward struck so quickly that Warwick and Clarence had no more opportunity to send Sir Robert Welles reinforcements. Eduard used his extensive artillery against the rebels so effectively that the rebels quickly suffered great losses. Panic broke out and the rebels fled from the king's well-armed forces against whom they stood no chance. The leaders of the rebels, Sir Robert Welles, Sir Thomas de la Lande and others were captured.

Consequences

Further rebellions in Yorkshire collapsed in the face of the victory of the royal army. Sir Robert Welles was executed on March 19th. On April 2, Eduard proclaimed Warwick and Clarence to be rebels and traitors, whereupon they both fled to France. Warwick made his allegiance to the House of Lancaster and formed an alliance with his old enemy Margaret of Anjou, wife of the overthrown Henry VI. from the House of Lancaster.

origin of the name

According to folk etymology , the name of the battle, Losecote, possibly came about as follows: Many of Welles' men wore jackets with Warwicks and Clarences crests. Not wanting them to carry this incriminating evidence when the withdrawal began, many of them threw their robes away while fleeing. That is why the name 'Lose-coat' came about. It is more likely that the place name comes from the Old English expression "hlose-cot", which roughly means "pigsty yard". Forms of Losecote also appear as field names in other parishes in Rutland. Contemporary sources do not speak of Losecote, but give the site of the battle as Hornfield.

literature

• Martin J. Dougherty: The Wars of the Roses . Amber Books, London 2015, ISBN 978-1-78274-239-5 .
• Anthony Goodman: The Wars of the Roses: Military Activity and English Society, 1452-97 . Routledge & Kegan Paul, London 1981, ISBN 0-415-05264-5 .
• Philip A. Haigh: The Military Campaigns of the Wars of the Roses . Sutton Publishing, Stroud 1995, ISBN 0-7509-1430-0 .
• Desmond Seward: The Wars of the Roses and the Lives of Five Men and Women in the Fifteenth Century . Constable, London 1995, ISBN 0-09-474100-X .
• Alison Weir: Lancaster and York. The Wars of the Roses . Jonathan Cape, London 1995, ISBN 0-224-03834-6 .

Individual evidence

1. ^ John A. Wagner: Encyclopedia of the Wars of the Roses . ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara, California 2001, ISBN 1-85109-358-3 , p. 148.
2. ^ Philip A. Haigh: The Military Campaigns of the Wars of the Roses . Sutton Publishing, Stroud 1995, ISBN 0-7509-1430-0 , pp. 104-106.
3. ^ Philip A. Haigh: The Military Campaigns of the Wars of the Roses . Sutton Publishing, Stroud 1995, ISBN 0-7509-1430-0 , pp. 106-107.
4. ^ Philip A. Haigh: The Military Campaigns of the Wars of the Roses . Sutton Publishing, Stroud 1995, ISBN 0-7509-1430-0 , p. 107.
5. ^ Alison Weir: Lancaster and York. The Wars of the Roses . Jonathan Cape, London 1995, ISBN 0-224-03834-6 , p. 359.
6. ^ Anthony Goodman: The Wars of the Roses: Military Activity and English Society, 1452-97 . Routledge & Kegan Paul, London 1981, ISBN 0-415-05264-5 , p. 71.
7. ^ Alison Weir: Lancaster and York. The Wars of the Roses . Jonathan Cape, London 1995, ISBN 0-224-03834-6 , p. 360.
8. ^ Alison Weir: Lancaster and York. The Wars of the Roses . Jonathan Cape, London 1995, ISBN 0-224-03834-6 , pp. 360-361.
9. ^ Alison Weir: Lancaster and York. The Wars of the Roses . Jonathan Cape, London 1995, ISBN 0-224-03834-6 , p. 361.
10. ^ John A. Wagner: Encyclopedia of the Wars of the Roses . ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara, California 2001, ISBN 1-85109-358-3 , p. 149.
11. ^ Philip A. Haigh: The Military Campaigns of the Wars of the Roses . Sutton Publishing, Stroud 1995, ISBN 0-7509-1430-0 , p. 108.
12. ^ Diana Dunn: War and Society in Medieval and Early Modern Britain . Liverpool University Press, Liverpool 2000, p. 41.

Coordinates: 52 ° 41 ′ 10 ″  N , 0 ° 32 ′ 10 ″  W.