Battle of Sark

The Battle of Sark , sometimes known as the Battle of Lochmaben Stone, was fought in October 1448 as part of the intermittent border war between England and Scotland left over from the Wars of Independence of the preceding century. It was the largest battle fought on the borders between Homildon in 1402 and Flodden in 1513. It was also one of the rare occasions that the Scots gained the advantage over the English in encounters that now tended to be dominated by the all-powerful longbow.

A Broken Peace

The peace between England and Scotland broke down in 1448 for reasons that are not entirely clear; but it was most probably due to one of the many minor border incidents which always had the potential to escalate out of control. The new war rapidly acquired a serious character. In May, the Scottish port of Dunbar was destroyed by Henry Percy, son of the Earl of Northumberland. This was followed a month later by the destruction of Dumfries by the Earl of Salisbury, warden of the march. These attacks did not necessarily mean a declaration of war on the kingdom of Scotland as such; but they most certainly meant war with the house of Douglas, by far the most powerful force on the Scottish march. In retaliation, William, the eighth Earl of Douglas, together with his kinsmen, the earls of Ormond, Angus and Orkney, destroyed Alnwick, the Percy capital, and Warkworth. Further destructive forays followed into Cumberland as well as Northumberland. The situation was considered serious enough to bring the unwarlike Henry VI north on a royal progress to Durham. Matters, however, were ultimately left in the hands of the Percies and their allies, who were authorised to lead the biggest punitive attack on Scotland in some years.

Northumberland Invades

In October Northumberland crossed the west march with an army estimated at 6000 men. Besides his son he was accompanied by Sir John Pennington, Sir Thomas Harrington, and one Magnus Redmane, possibly some kind of professional soldier or freebooter. No sooner had they crossed the River Sark than the army made camp at Gretna, presumably with the intention of fanning out from here across the adjacent countryside. If so Northumberland showed a deplorable lack of military skill in his choice of base. His army was placed between the Sark and the Kirtle Water, close to where both flow into the Solway, a dangerous tidal waterway. Near to this camp stood a feature known as the Lochmaben Stone, the lonely survivor of an ancient prehistoric circle. An army caught in this position would effectively be locked in a natural vice.

Ormond's March

From the first the Scots were aware of Northumberland's presence. Hugh, earl of Ormond, a brother of the earl of Douglas, set about organising the men of Annandale and Nithsdale to resist the invasion. With the help of Sir John Wallace of Craigie, the sheriff of Ayr, Herbert Maxwell of Caerlaverock and other border gentry, he gathered about 4000 men. On 23 October 1448 Ormond's army marched into battle. Northumberland clearly believed that there was no major force in the area capable of resisting his invasion, for he appeares to have been taken by surprise. When the Scots approached he rapidly organised his men into their battle divisions: his left wing, mainly Welsh bowmen, was placed close to the Kirtle Water, under the command of Sir John Pennington; Northumberland himself took charge of the centre; and the right, stretching towards the Sark, was under the command of Redmane. To the rear of the whole was the mud and marshes of the Solway. What is worse, the tide was beginning to advance.

Ormond arranged his own forces to match the disposition of the enemy. The left-opposite Magnus Redmane-was under Craigie; Ormond faced Northumberland in the centre, and the right was placed underv the joint command of Maxwell and the Laird of Johnstone, the ancestor of the Johnstones of Annandale. All ready, the two sides were quick to close in combat

Lochmaben Stone

The English opened the engagement in the usual fashion with a discharge of arrows; and for a brief period it looked as if the battle was going to repeat previous Scottish disasters. But it would appear from the outcome of the struggle that Northumberland had insufficient time to see that the archers were supported by spearmen or cavalry. Perceiving this weakness Wallace of Craigie ordered his spearmen on an immediate charge, which scythed into Redmane's division. Pitscottie, the Scottish chronicler, provides a vivid account of Craigie's charge;

...his men wes sa inraget and ruschit sa furieouslie wpoun the Inglisch wangaird with exes, speris and halberts and maid sa great slaughter at the first tocoming that they put the Inglisch men cleane abak fre thair standard and compelld thame at last to tak to flight.

Redmane was slain and his division routed. Heartened by Craigie's example the rest of the army followed him into battle. Unable to wihstand the onslaught the English found themselves pushed back towards the Solway channel. Pitscottie continues the story;

.''..the filling of the sea, caused many to lose their lyves and perisch in the watteris. Utheris, siean this, doubted quhidder they would fight and die with honour or live with schame, and preferring the on to the other, were cruellie slain upon the water bankis. ''

According to the Auchinlek Chronicle, a brief but important contemporary source, 1500 Englishmen were slain and a further 500 drowned in flight. Many prisoners were taken, including Pennington and Henry Percy the younger, caught after helping his father escape. Estimated Scots losses range from a low of 26 to a high of 600, the most serious of whom was Wallace of Craigie, who was mortally wounded, dying some time after the battle he had done so much to win.

Red Douglas

The Battle of Sark was an important landmark in the history of border warfare, although it is now almost completely forgotten. For the first time since Otterburn the Scots had gained a significant victory, helping to wipe out the memory of Homildon. Until the reign of Edward IV they held the military initiative on the marches against an opponent weighed down by foreign and then civil war. But it also had the effect of increasing still further the prestige of the Douglas clan, an not altogether comfortable outcome for the Scottish government. A very few years after Sark they were brought to ruin not be the English but by the King of Scots himself.

References

The Auchinleck Chronicle, ed. T. Thomson, 1829.
Griffiths, R. A., The Reign of Henry VI, 1981.
Hodgkin, T., The Warden of the Northern Marches, 1908.
Neilson, G., The Battle of Sark, in Transactions of the Dumfriesshire and Galloway Antiquarian and Natural History Society, vol. 13 1898.
Pittscottie, Robert Lindsay of, The History and Chronicles of Scotland, 1899.