The might of Wales

[Monk]

Not a bad start DaVega. Will be interesting to see how far the Welsh can take their war of expansion!

[DaVega]

Allright, you guys, here is the next chapter of my AAR! I hope you will enjoy reading it I'm already busy with writing the next chapter, altough I can't say when it will be finished! Comments are still welcome of course I'm sorry for the small amount of pictures in this part, the next part will have a lot more pictures!

Volume 1 - Chapter 2 - Royal wickedness

The year of our lord 1420, August 12th.
Montgomery, Powys Principality.
Pub ‘The Golden Pig’.

After Duwalyn In Powyff finished telling you his previous story, he sat quietly on his seat for a while, thinking about what to tell you next about the history of the kingdom of Wales. He asks you; ‘ Do you know why we have a national day of celebration each 20th of January?’
You answer positively, knowing that January 20th is the day the great king Llywelyn the Honourable conquered his first city, and started to build his empire what his father Gruffudd would have wanted.
Duwalyn nods to you in excitement. ‘Yeah, on the 20th of January in the year of our Lord 1258, the Hero of Wales besieged Shrewsbury and took it in is fathers name. But a lot more things happened in that year. It was quite a turbulent year, ay, so let me continue my story.’
’Wait, let me get myself another paper scroll. The previous one I’ve used is nearly full I’m afraid.’
Duwalyn laughs and tells you; ‘I think you are going to need some more scrolls soon, my son, for the next part of my story is rather long…’

The year of our lord 1258, November 29th.
Pembroke castle, Principality of Pembrokeshire.
Royal gardens.

General Maredudd was strafing through the royal gardens, together with one of his closest friends, captain Ionafal. Although is was a cold winter, the castle of Pembroke was situated close to the Irish Sea, and because of this the area was under the influence of the warm sea-wind. Maredudd did spend more and more time in these gardens as the years passed, particularly in the winter, as he loved the sight of the snow lying on top of all the plants and tree-branches. He wasn’t as healthy or strong as he used to be, back in the years when he was the closest companion to Gruffudd the Great, be he was still an able man, longing to fight with his enemies once more. He didn’t know that wish was about to come true.
‘So tell me, captain, how does the training of our new troops here in Pembroke and in our other settlements progress?’
Captain Ionafal did his best to follow the general, but the thick layer of snow present in the royal gardens didn’t make it easy for him, as he was strapped in his battle-armour.
‘Sir, I just came north from Caernarvon and Montgomery to tell you that our new troops there are finished with their training and are ready for anyone’s command. I’ve also spoken with the heads of the architect-guilds in both cities, and they told me that they finished the construction of permanent paved roads between all of our major settlements.’
‘That’s very good news, my friend, because we definitely could use those troops for the military campaign in central Wales, lead by king Llywelyn. I just spoke a few minutes ago with garrison commander Cadwallon, and he told me that the training of the new units of cavalry and infantry we commissioned here is close to being completed.’
’Indeed my liege, but I was also send here by general Rhodri from fort Wynfyd to tell you that he had been send towards Montgomery to govern that city whilst our king is leading the military campaign against the English.’
‘That’s good to hear, I have no doubt that Rhodri will make a decent governor.’
Captain Ionafal swallowed and became visibly nervous. ‘Sir, that’s not the only message I was sent for. General Rhodri also told me that “You have to make sure that lazy-ass Maredudd distracts the English in south-Wales by any means possible, whilst we are going to lay siege to the city of Shrewsbury”.’
’Did he said that, my friend?’. General Maredudd was slightly insulted by the words of the younger, and physically stronger Rhodri. He thought about what he could do best to serve his king. Finally he said; ‘Very well, we will deliver our English enemies to the north the distraction they need. Send words to the commanding officers in the castle, Ionofal. Tonight we will leave this castle and head for the English-held city of Cardiff. It is time we reunite our brothers and sisters in that city with the rest of free-Wales.’



Meanwhile, in the middle of the Irish Sea, admiral Hywel was standing on the foredeck of his galley, which was called "The Spirit of Wales". 'Damn fog', he whispered to himself, because he wasn't able to see more than a hundred feet far in this thick fog. It is strange for such an amount of fog to hang silent on the middle of the sea, and they weren't able to sail past it in the first place because the fog surprised them whilst they were almost all at sleep.
It has been 18 days since they left the shores of Pembrokeshire, and the young admiral was sent on a mission to explore the shores bordering the Irish Sea. This reconnaissance would prove to be useful if they could find the English ports in Ireland, from which their enemies did send more and more military expeditions lately. He cursed himself for not being able to leave this fog behind them, and above all, for not being able to tell in what direction they were heading. This could prove to be disastrous, because they could wind up in front of an English port or sea-patrol once the fog vanished.
Suddenly, the man admiral Hywel did put on guard duty in the crow's nest on top of the main sail shouted; 'Sir! I see three ships in front of us, about 150 feet away!'.
'Good, that should be the supplies they promised us back home.' When the three ships got closer to their own, they could see a dozen of archers standing on each ship.
'Sir, they're not Welsh ships, they are English!'
Admiral Hywel's blood froze in his veins. 'Well, I'll be damned..', he whispered.



Captain Tegonwy was patrolling the walls and streets of Caernarvon, together with his squad of local raised town militia. They were making their way trough the main street of the city, towards the main entry gate, when one of the man saw a hooded figure walking just fifty meters in front of them. He was acting suspicious, looking from one side of the street to the other, as it seems he didn't want to be seen.
As the captain and his company of men closed in on this man, he suddenly ran away into an alley. Tegonwy ordered three of his men to go after him, whilst he sneaked around the corner of a local brothel, thanking God that he knew the same alley the hooded man entered, had only one exit. Due to this, the man was quickly subdued and was taken to captain Tegonwy for interrogation.
'I don't know about you, but we here in Caernarvon grow suspicious when a dark figure suddenly runs away from a normal street-patrol of soldiers. So please explain to me, why did you run away? I know we all look frightening and stuff', his men laughed, 'but there is no reason to suddenly run away.'
'Captain, I-I am Theodore Albane, and I am a son of a local merchant. I was given entry to the city by the guards at the gate!'
'Well, we two are going to check about that.' Tegonwy ordered one of his men to take Theodore to the guards at the main gate, who were all standing at attention.
'You there!', as captain Tegonwy pointed at one of the guards, 'did you gave this man entry to the city in the past hour?'
The guard looked a bit surprised, as he studied the face of the man they held hostage. 'Sir, I don't think we did sir!'
'So, you lied to us then, Theodore. I don't know who you are, but we will take you to the cellars of our fortress, and trust me, we will find out who you are, and what you were doing here, sneaking into our city.' It was going to be a bloody and painful time for this man..

King Llywelyn was leaving fort Cadwgan in company with his assaulting force, and was heading to the south-east were the English-held city of Shrewsbury was located, when a messenger delivered him word of the aggressive behaviour of his younger brother. This came not as a surprise to him, because he knew his brother since his birth, and he knew how aggressive he could be.
‘Damn, how could my own brother deny my direct order of holding the fort of Caernarvon? I am the king of Wales for God sake! Does he question my authority?’
The messenger, slightly nervous, answered; ‘My lord, I don’t think he questions your authority, but he simply was upset that he would be denied a battle, whilst the rest of our forces were fighting the English all over the country.’
The king thought for a moment, and answered after a while; ‘Yeah I think I couldn’t handle the situation if was in the position of my brother. We could use his aggressiveness. If he attacks the English to the north of us, they will be too busy to reinforce their troops around Shrewsbury.’



A few days later, the Hero of Wales arrived at the small city of Shrewsbury, and was preparing for a prolonged siege, when a small group of men marched out of the city.
‘What are they thinking? Do they really think they could defeat our forces with that?’ But then they saw the white flag one of the soldiers was carrying. ‘Ah, it seems they want to talk.’

‘My honourable king of Wales, I am sir Gower, head of the city council of Shrewsbury, and I like to discuss our terms.’, the man explained to the king after they arrived at the royal tent in which the king was planning the siege.
’What terms my friend? I didn’t offer you any, did I?’
‘My lord, I didn’t want to insult you in any way. I just came here to offer you the hand of my daughter!’
’What good is the hand of your daughter? Is the rest of her body still attached to it?’ The rest of the Welsh soldiers who were present in the tent laughed.
‘Yes of course, sir! But I humbly request that you marry my daughter, and please leave our city alone!’
The king thought about that, about marrying the daughter of an English noble, and when a plan emerged in his head, a little smile appeared on his face. ‘All right, I will marry your daughter, sir Longarm, and for that, we will leave you alone!’
The head of the city council fell on his knees when he heard this, and was planning on kissing the kings feet. But the king refused to let an Englishmen kiss his very own feet, and threw the man backwards. ‘Don’t you even think about kissing my feet, you English pig! Go back into your city and send word to your daughter that she is going to get married soon!’

When the daughter of sir Gower entered the royal tent, everyone fell silent. She was a very beautiful women, although she was English of course, with curly blond hair and blue eyes. She walked towards king Llywelyn, and stood still in front of him.
‘King Llywelyn of Wales, I am Gwefryl of Gower, and I was send here on my fathers request. It will be an honour to marry you!’
The king’s heart seemed to melt at the sight of the beautiful girl, and was suddenly much weaker in words then he used to be.



After an hour, when the king and Gwefryl were talking privately in his tent, captain Voripor was ordered into the tent.
’Sir, you wanted to talk to me?’
’Yeah I do. Captain, tell your men to get ready for a siege, we will start in a couple of hours in the middle of the night when they least expect it!’
‘Sir, but I thought we would leave the city alone after you agreed to marry lady Gower?’
’I know, but we did leave them alone, haven’t you noticed? We are already sitting here idle for a couple of hours. They didn’t specify the exact amount of time the wished to be left alone!’
The captain laughed when he heard the wicked plan of the king. ‘No sir, they did not! I will order the men to get battle-ready!’

[DaVega]

Good news! I found myself some spare time (an hour or two), so I decided to type the next chapter As always, enjoy reading it! ;-)

Volume 1 - Chapter 3 - The road to victory

The year of our lord 1420, August 12th.
Montgomery, Powys Principality.
Pub ‘The Golden Pig’.

You think a while about what king Llywelyn did in the previous part of Duwalyn’s story. Didn’t he have any honour? ‘ I thought king Llywelyn was known as being ‘The honourable’’?, you ask Duwalyn. He stares in your eyes for a while, and finally explains to you why the king broke his promise of not assaulting the city of Shrewsbury, after being offered a marriage with the daughter of the head of the city council.
‘Dear friend, do you know what the English king ordered his men to do when they assaulted the city of Pembroke? When they started their conquest of our motherland?’
You sense some horrible story coming, but you don’t know what happened back then, so you answer negatively.
‘The English king asked for the city council to come out of the city for an diplomatic meeting with his ambassadors, under the sway of a white flag. Not expecting any kind of dishonourable deed, the city council did as he asked, intending on sparing the city’s inhabitants.’ Duwalyn sighed. ‘Two hours later, the heads of all members of the council were catapulted over the city walls.’
You are disgusted by this low-hearted and evil betrayal on part of the English king. ‘So now you know why king Llywelyn did not trust any kind of English diplomacy, and felt not dishonoured by his deed. He felt as taking revenge for those council members who were killed all those years ago. King Llywelyn continued his campaign with two almost simultaneous battles. The first of these battles was the battle of Chesterfield…’.

The year of our Lord 1259, January 20th.
Military camp three hours northeast of Chester, Chestershire.
Perimeter of patrolled area outside the camp.

The two men who were sent by Prince Dafydd to explore the city of Chester and it’s surrounding countryside hastily returned from their exploration trip. It was a cold evening, and the sun went under the horizon just an hour ago. Snow was lying on top of every tree and plant and the men were careful to erase their footsteps in the snow, in case if someone was following them. They were trained in the fine art of stealth and exploring enemy territory, so they definitely knew what they were doing.
Once they reached the edge of the military camp established by the prince, they let down their guard and walked with normal speed towards the centre of the camp. They were spotted by one of the patrolling officers who recognized them almost instantly. He nodded towards the pair, and said; ‘You both know in which tent the prince resides. Good luck!’

The moment they entered the royal tent, the prince stood up from his seat and said joyfully; ‘Ah there you are, my most skilled scouts. Please report your findings to me!’
The tallest of the two scouts coughed and started to make his report. ‘My prince, I do not know if the English spotted our troops in the field, or if they did it independent of us, but almost an hour ago the main garrison of Chester sallied out of the city, and were marching in a direction towards our camp!’
Prince Dafydd was surprised to hear this. ‘I don’t think they know that were are located here, otherwise they would have attacked during daytime. Attacking an entrenched army in the middle of the night in this thick forest is downright suicide. But it does not matter whether they know we are here or not, I would prefer to attack them in the open, instead of attacking them whilst they are defending Chester. Can you estimate their strength?’
‘Sir, they left some men behind in the city, so I would estimate their numbers around seven hundred. I am also glad to report that general Alan la Zouche was not with the men who sallied out of the city!’
‘Then they surely do not know our presence here. Those troops must be on their way to reinforce the area which is being attacked by my brother, the king.’ The prince strode towards a statue in the tent which was holding his decorative battle armour and weaponry. ‘Send words to the commanding officers, and ask them to make our troops ready for war. We will march out of our camp in half an hour!’



For the past hour, the troops under the command of prince Daffyd had marched through thick forests and hills in north-eastern Wales, before they were commanded to stop. They had been marching in battle formation which was typical for an army in that time. Ranged troops in rows of three man thick in front of the army, followed by the main line of infantry. The bodyguards of the prince himself, and a unit of heavy cavalry both protected the flanks of the men on foot. The line of archers consisted of Helwyr, Wales’ finest longbowmen, trained in the art of delivering a deadly barrage of arrows well over three hundred meter away. They could be the best archers by far in the whole of Britannia. Daffyd’s infantry force consisted of spearmen from the principality of Meirionnydd, as well as local town militia, Gwent raiders, and some hired Welsh spearmen. In total, there were about 1100 Welshmen present at the battle of Chesterfield.
At the other side of the battlefield, the English troops under the command of the veteran captain Loefwine assembled in a similar formation as the Welsh, although he and his light cavalry preferred to hide behind his combined shield of archers and infantry. This is probably due to the cowardness of the English, or Loefwine’s plan to run the Welsh down once they started routing. Captain Loefwine was surprised once they saw the army of Wales, but due to his long military training, he quickly ordered his men into battle formation, and waited what his Welsh adversary would do. His men included longbowmen, which are, ironically, based upon the Welsh longbowmen, as well as a combined infantry line of Chester’s town and spear militias.

Prince Dafydd ordered his horse to march along the line of his army, whilst his loyal bodyguard remained at the flank of his troops. He marched towards the centre of the infantry line and stopped there. He was utmost proud to see so much of his countrymen under his command, ready to do his bidding. He was determined to prove himself today, for himself, his brother, and all people in the kingdom of Wales!
‘It offends my eye that I should be forced to gaze upon such an unwashed and ignorant bunch of scrofulous, poxed knaves and villains. Men, I give you your enemies for the coming battle! I have rarely seen such a collection of worms and beetles beyond the dusty walls of a scriptorium! Let’s be at it, in case their stupidity should prove infectious!’. The speech of prince Dafydd would prove to be legendary one day.

’Captain Custennin, I want you and your Helwyr forward, about 30 feet, and spread out. If those English archers open fire, I do not want you to suffer large casualties. Ignite the tips of your arrows, in order to estimate the range of your men, and to make those pigs burn!’
Once Custennin had moved up his line of archers, he turned at his spot and looked at Dafydd. He looked back at the captain, seeing the grim determination in his eyes. ‘Men! Prepare your bows!’. All of the Helwyr stretched their bows. ‘Aim!’ The archers simultaneously aimed their arrows towards the sky. ‘Fire!’



It was as if hell itself was unleashed, as three hundred ignited arrows simultaneously made their way across the dark night sky. Once the barrage of arrows closed in on the English longbowmen, the prince commanded captain Custennin, and all of the commanders under his command to fire at will at the English troops. By this time the first volley of arrows hit the English front lines. Even from a hundred and fifty meters away, the Welsh troops could see English archers who caught fire and the could hear their blood-chilling screams. It was not long before a second volley was unleashed upon the English army, but by that time, the English longbowmen had their answer ready and fired a returning volley against the Helwyr. Although prince Dafydd had ordered his archers to stand at a loose formation, the English arrows proved to be present in overwhelming numbers, and about a dozen brave Helwyr fell to the ground, mortally wounded. By the time the archers had fired their third volley, and absorbed yet another volley of English arrows, prince Dafydd could see the English line of infantry making their way through their archers. He knew it was time to send in his infantry to counter theirs.
‘Captain Gronw!’ He shouted towards the spearmen from Meirionnydd.
‘Sir?’, was his answer.
‘You see those English bastards making their way across the field? Make them disappear!’
At the same time, Dafydd ordered his personal bodyguards, and the unit of heavy cavalry under the command of captain Rynwr to run to a spot a hundred meters behind the enemies rear.



By the time captain Gronw and his men were some fifty meters away from the English lines, he ordered a full frontal charge into the English. At almost the same time, the English commander must have thought the same, as the enemy troops charged towards the Welsh. At the moment of impact, spears broke, axes and shield collided, and a bloody brawl commenced. The morale of the English militia must have been very low, for they almost immediately routed once their line join the Welsh. It started with a few men running away towards their rear where captain Loefwine was located, but a few moments later, it seemed as if the entire English infantry line was routing.
‘Kill them all men! Don’t let those cowardly pigs get away!’, captain Grown shouted as he firmly planted his axe into the head of an Englishmen.



At the same time, captain Custennin ordered his Helwyr to stop firing. He was afraid his arrows would only inflict friendly casualties. Although he stopped firing, he and his men had already inflicted severe casualties in the lines of the English militia.
Once prince Dafydd saw the enemy infantry run away, he ordered his personal bodyguard to change direction and charge into the flank of the longbowmen who took position behind their captain. On the other side of the battlefield, captain Rynwyr did the same thing, but in stead of archers, he charged directly into the cavalry unit of Loefwine.
‘Charge!!’, Dafydd screamed, as he ordered his steed towards the English longbowmen. ‘This is for my father!’, as he decapitated the first archer he passed.



By this time, captain Loefwine saw he could not win this battle, and ordered a full scale rout towards the city of Chester. The Welsh cavalry was way quicker than most English troops, and thus they were cut down like grass. Many Englishmen were captured by the fast Welsh cavalry. Although a large portion of the English army was captured, captain Loefwine was able to get away, probably due to his fast horse. But nonetheless, almost an half of the enemy army was taken prisoner. After Dafydd had rallied most of his men, they shouted; ‘ Victory! Victory for our people, for our king!’
Dafydd ordered all of the English prisoners to be executed at once, one part because of his father, and the other part for making a statement towards the English king in London. He had proven himself to be a worthy commander, and had won the first battle on the road to Welsh victory. It was a total victory!

[Monk]

No doubt the English will be feeling that one: their armies completely humiliated and destroyed on the field of battle! What are your plans to take advantage of the victory? Is it too early to dream of a conquered London?

[DaVega]

I think I will be able to capture the city of Chester because their main garrison was destroyed in the battle above ;-) And yeah.. I will be able to capture London in the future, but that will take a bit more time :P I think I will be able to post the next chapter in a day or two, because i'm quite busy now with my study!

[DaVega]

Since i posted my AAR on twcenter.net, i wil not continue to post my story online here ;) You can follow the rest of my story (i just posted another chapter online) on

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=290299

I hope you enjoy the rest of the story!