The English Resistance: The Underground War Against the Normans by Peter Rex

Author:Peter Rex [Rex, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Europe, Medieval, Non Fiction
Publisher: Amberley Publishing
Published: 2014-08-05T22:00:00+00:00

The Sack of Peterborough

Having dismissed his army at Salisbury on his return from the North, William held his Easter Court of 1070 at Westminster. He then proceeded to take action in a great council at Winchester to confirm his power, ‘in a kingdom he had but newly acquired’ (Florence) by depriving ‘certain persons’, namely bishops and abbots, of their positions and honours ‘without their being guilty of any open crime’ and imprisoned them for life. This was done, says Florence again, ‘solely by mistrust of losing his newly acquired kingdom’. This left the other bishops trembling in anticipation of the loss of their own honours. This account does suggest that William realised that the rebellion in the North had been a very dangerous one and that he might easily have been defeated. That phrase used twice by Florence of Worcester, about William’s ‘newly acquired’ kingdom, suggests that the Chronicler did not regard the kingdom as fully won by William until after the defeat of the northern rebellion.

Events immediately after this remain somewhat obscure, especially the movements of the Danish fleet which had been expected, in accordance with its agreement with the king, to return to Denmark. It appears that Swein Estrithson of Denmark now took a hand in person. Sometime in the spring of 1070 he arrived off the Humber and ordered his fleet to break the agreement and instead move down to the Wash and into the Ouse, intending to set up a base at Ely.

Once there, the Danes joined forces with the outlawed Lincolnshire thegn Hereward. This man is introduced into the account of the year 1070 in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in exactly the same manner as other prominent men are introduced, as though the reader will know immediately who he is. When he is mentioned he has already risen to a position of leadership. Hereward and his genge (variously rendered by translators as gang, band or company) then joined the Danes in an attack on Peterborough Abbey, an attack which took place apparently in late spring 1071. Details of the attack are given in the Peterborough version of the Chronicle and by Hugh Candidus in his History of the Abbey. After the attack the Danes did not, as the English had hoped, persist in their incursion but returned to Denmark, leaving Hereward and his followers to maintain a desperate last stand against King William.

If that were all there was to this affair it would be of little significance, but on reflection it can be seen to be a more serious matter than first appears. There is the fact that after the Danes had left, Hereward was joined at Ely by the remaining disaffected English magnates. A number had already been reconciled to King William after renewing their submission, such as Earl Waltheof and Cospatrick, and others had taken refuge in Scotland with the Aetheling and his family. But Earl Morcar, accompanied according to some accounts by his brother Earl Edwin, together with Bishop Aethelwine of Durham, the

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