Towton, 29 March 1461

The battle, stage by stage

1. 27–28 March 1461, before dawn

   Ferrybridge

   Three weeks after Edward of York was proclaimed king in London, his army reaches the River Aire at Pontefract. The Lancastrians of Henry VI, led by Henry Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, have fallen back to a position south of Tadcaster. A Yorkist party under John Radcliffe, Lord FitzWalter, secures the crossing at Ferrybridge, whose bridge had been broken down. Before dawn on the 28th, by Hall's account, Lord Clifford's riders — the 'Flower of Craven' — fall on them as they rest; FitzWalter and Warwick's half-brother, the Bastard of Salisbury, are killed. The sources (Hall, Waurin, George Neville's letter) tell this differently, and the timing is itself debated.

2. 28 March, morning

   The fight for the bridge and the Castleford ford

   Edward brings up his army and attacks across the narrow, broken bridge, but Clifford's men hold it; the Earl of Warwick is reportedly wounded in the leg. William Neville, Lord Fauconberg, with Lord Blount and Robert Horne, is sent upstream to cross the Aire at Castleford, about three miles to the west, and ride round onto Clifford's flank. Threatened from behind, Clifford abandons the bridge and withdraws north toward the main Lancastrian army.

3. 28 March, afternoon (or early 29 March)

   Dintingdale

   Fauconberg's riders catch Clifford's men at Dintingdale, a dip in the lane from Saxton to Scarthingwell, about a mile short of the Lancastrian lines. Clifford, said to have taken off his gorget, is killed by an arrow in the throat, and most of his men with him. Edward's army crosses the Aire and camps around Sherburn in Elmet and Saxton. Historic England places Dintingdale inside the registered battlefield; Tim Sutherland has argued that these fights happened early on the Sunday morning and ran straight into the main battle.

4. 29 March 1461 (Palm Sunday), morning

   Drawn up across the plateau

   The Lancastrians, probably the larger army, stand on the rise north of Towton Dale, a shallow valley that cuts across the narrowest part of the plateau between the steep Cock Beck valley on the west and the wet carr land toward the Wharfe on the east. The Yorkists form on the ridge to the south. Each army is drawn up in 'battles'; which lord led which Lancastrian battle is not agreed — Somerset was in overall command, with Northumberland, Exeter, Dacre and Sir Andrew Trollope. Strengths are guesses: perhaps 25,000–40,000 Lancastrians and somewhat fewer Yorkists before Norfolk arrived; the old totals of 100,000 and more are not credible.

5. Late morning

   Arrows in the snow

   Snow begins to fall, driven by a south wind into the Lancastrians' faces. In the story told by Hall's chronicle — written some 70–80 years later, so treat it as Tudor tradition — Fauconberg's archers step forward, loose one flight with the wind behind them, and step back; the Lancastrian archers, unable to see, shoot into the empty ground in front of them until their arrows run out, and the Yorkists pick up the fallen arrows and shoot them back. The archaeological survey found a band of arrowheads running east–west across the centre of the plateau, consistent with an archery exchange there.

6. Midday

   The Lancastrians come down

   Stung by the arrows, the Lancastrians advance down into the dale and up against the Yorkist line, and the battle turns into a long hand-to-hand struggle of bills, poleaxes and swords. Waurin says that Lancastrian horsemen routed the Yorkist cavalry on one wing; later tradition puts an ambush party in Castle Hill Wood that fell on the Yorkist left. The pursuers chase the fleeing horse off the field instead of turning on the Yorkist foot. Fragments of hand-guns found by the survey on the Lancastrian side of the field suggest some early firearms were used. For about three hours — later writers speak of the battle lasting all day — neither side breaks; Edward, 18 and very tall, is said to have fought on foot among his men to hold them together.

7. Afternoon

   Norfolk's men arrive

   John Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, had been slowed by illness, and his contingent arrives late from the south-east, coming up onto the Yorkist right — the eastern flank. Exactly which road they used is disputed (accounts name the Old London Road; others the Ferrybridge–Tadcaster road). By now the Lancastrian right has gained ground and the Yorkist left has bent back toward Castle Hill Wood. The fresh troops press the tired Lancastrian left, and the whole Lancastrian line begins to wheel and give way toward the north-west.

8. Late afternoon into evening

   Bloody Meadow and the Cock Beck

   The Lancastrian army breaks. Many men run north-west down the steep slopes into the Cock Beck, swollen by snowmelt, where the ground has been called Bloody Meadow; drowned men are said to have formed a bridge for those behind. Others flee north through Towton toward Tadcaster and York, where a bridge reportedly collapsed under the crowd. Orders to give no quarter are reported. Northumberland, Dacre and Trollope are among the dead; Somerset and Exeter escape and flee to Scotland with Henry VI. George Neville and a newsletter of 4 April put the dead at 28,000, but that is likely an exaggeration (the Annales give about 9,000 Lancastrians). The mass grave found at Towton Hall in 1996 held dozens of men (at least 37 recovered intact; Historic England counts at least 60) with brutal head wounds — some killed after they had stopped fighting.