Alternate history: the Anarchy of King Stephen.

[King Henry V]

Sorry, my creative juices were a bit broken when my grandmother came and strictly limited my time on the PC, however, I have just written a paragraph, though I am a bit busy at the moment with exams.

[Ludens]

Sorry, my creative juices were a bit broken when my grandmother came and strictly limited my time on the PC, however, I have just written a paragraph, though I am a bit busy at the moment with exams.

I see. Well, I am also a bit too busy to waste time with interactive histories so it is probably for the best. Still, let us know when you are able to resume writing .

[Mouzafphaerre]

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Belated good luck with the exams! I still gotta read the last half page.
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[King Henry V]

Well, after four months I have finally completed the next installment! Sorry for the huge delay.

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You inform the nobles of your decision that you will lead the army across the rebel lands and into Beaumont’s Midland fiefdoms, where you can hope to strengthen your army before marching on London.
There is a look of disappointment on the barons’ faces as you tell them. They have marched with you deep into Wales, they have fought hard to gain a crushing if costly victory against the Welsh and now having returned to safe territory to find the realm in crisis and enemies in their midst, they are not permitted to deal with these enemies and leave their homes in safety before once again venturing forth into hostile lands.
Nevertheless, they will follow along with the rest of the exhausted army.
All the barons will be allowed a week’s leave during which they may return to their lands and deal with any urgent business, raise any more soldiers than can be found, gather more supplies and collect the scutage money form those who do not fight to deal with shortages in manpower or food. A week from today, the barons are to meet your army in Monmouth, which you are to secure in the mean time. To do so, you and Robert of Leicester will command the rest of the army in a lightning strike against the Angevin garrison of the town. Together, you hatch a plan.
Firstly, six squires shall ride into the town two days from now. They will wait until evening the next day before carrying out their mission: one will create a diversion in the town whilst the other two attempt to open the town’s main gate. Outside the town will wait all your horsemen, who shall ride through the gate to seize Monmouth once your squires give the signal.
With the town taken, the cavalry will hold Monmouth until the arrival of the footmen of your army, which will storm the castle should it still hold out.
You lay out the plans of battle to Robert, who nods his head and raises his goblet of malmsey wine in a toast.
“To victory”, he says.
“To victory,” you repeat.
And on to Monmouth.

The rain drizzled down heavily, pouring off helmets and drenching every man to the skin. The rain soaks through the ground, turning the narrow track into a boggy mire, the thick mud sucking men’s boots further into the brown morass. Men shout and curse as they heave carts out of the mud and pray for the rain to stop.
It is now two days since you left Monmouth. Your plan to capture the town was a success. Everything proceeded according to plan, and the town and the castle fell with little loss to your soldiers. The commanders of the Angevin garrison are dead and their corpses now rot in the castle ditch, where the ravens feast on their putrid flesh.
The townspeople of Monmouth seemed relatively indifferent to the change of control and have accepted you as their rightful ruler. You left behind a garrison of 80 spearmen and men-at-arms commanded by one of Gilbert of Clare’s knights.
As agreed, the Marcher barons met you at Monmouth one week after they left Usk, and you now have an army of two hundred knights, three hundred and fifty mounted and dismounted men-at-arms, two hundred spearmen and seventy-five bowmen.
Many of your men are mercenaries hired with the scutage tax and the remaining gold of your lords. Their Welsh estates are now hard pressed both financially and militarily, and they are unhappy fighting a prolonged campaign far from their lands while Angevin lords still remain a threat closer to home. Few of your barons will continue with you much further than Worcester.
Robert of Leicester has already departed for Worcester with a handful of his knights, from which you are now one and a half day’s march away.
Thick mist shrouds your column, and those at the rear can barely see those at the front. The woods that flank the track are faintly visible. You shiver from the cold and pull your cloak more tightly around your shoulders in an effort to keep warm.
After a while the rain ceases, yet the fog still remains as impenetrable as ever. Soon you approach a stream, swollen by the heavy spring rains, over which has been built a small wooden bridge, barely large enough to permit the crossing of carts. The first of your men cross the bridge. A knight’s mount stalls as it approaches the bridge. It snorts and whinnies and attempts to shy away from the crossing. The knight angrily digs his heels into his horse’s flanks and yanks at the reins, forcing the horse to cross.
Following behind you and your royal guard is the baggage train, where the food, drink, arrows and tents for your army are carried in heavy carts pulled by stout shire horses. After your cross the bridge, you hear shouts and curses as the first of the carts become stuck in a rut before the bridge. You take no notice of it and order the rest of the column to carry on.
It is then that a horn sounds, its deep loud tone piercing through the fog. You twist to the right in your saddle to where the sound came from. You see vague shapes at the tree line. Then you hear the unmistakable sound of massed horses’ hooves thumping down on the ground. You see the glint of steel in the faint sun. Your men see it also, and soon the entire first part of the column disintegrates into chaos as the dismounted peasant spearmen run for their lives.
You draw your sword, but you know that resistance is hopeless. The horsemen are about to cut off your retreat at the bridge, so you turn your horse to the left and spur it on. As the horse gallops away from the pursuing enemy, you spot a small hill in the mist about fifty yards away. The slope is quite steep, which could perhaps help to stop a cavalry charge. It is your only hope.
“To the hill!” you cry. “To the hill!”
The men-at-arms and knights, more seasoned in warfare, hear you cry and rally to you. However, the spearmen, poorly trained and armed, are not so clear-headed. Panic engulfs and they flee in all directions, making the easiest targets for the horsemen at their heels. You hear the first cries of pain as the knights slash down their swords or thrust their long lances into the fleeing spearmen.
However, the enemy are distracted by this easy prey and ruthlessly pursue the hapless spearmen across the sodden ground, giving the knights and men-at-arms around you to group together and reach the mound. You form a small rearguard of knights to protect your retreating footmen from any of your pursuers who approach too near.
You wheel your horse around to face a charging knight, screaming at the top of his voice and his lance tilted and poised to impale your chest. You lower your sword. Just as the lance is about to pass your horse’s head, you flash your sword round, deflect the tip from your body and slash the blade at the rider’s unprotected neck. Blood splashes across your face as the sword partially decapitates your adversary.
You turn your horse and spur it on to the mound, leaving the dead horseman’s body limp in the saddle.
At the bridge, the rebels are vociferously attacking your men, pinning down the rest of the column and preventing them from coming to your aid. You are now completely cut off from all relief. Some of the horsemen try to cross the stream, yet the rain-swollen waters are too deep to allow them that.
By now most of your group has reached the hillock. The knoll resembles one of the burial mounds that you have seen elsewhere, built by one of the old peoples who inhabited the land of England long before your grandfather conquered it and even perhaps before the English did so themselves.
Your order the knights to dismount and the soldiers to form a wall with their shields around the rim of the steep slope. Your banner of the Centaur, which your guard rescued from the chaos, flutters lightly in the feeble wind. More enemy soldiers arrive from the trees, including a large party of knights carrying their own banner. You see the coat of arms of Robert of Gloucester, and recognise a dark haired, stocky man barking out orders to his knights as one of Robert’s castellans, Miles, castellan of Gloucester.
You roughly count about four hundred men, more than enough to hold off the rest of your army and destroy you and your small group of men. The rain begins again and you see Miles’ knights regrouping after having slaughtered every visible spearman without mercy. You order the men to tighten their ranks and make sure every shield is firm. Sixty swordsmen against more than a hundred knights. It will be a close fight indeed. However, hopefully the tactic that served your uncle the King so well at the battle of Brémule will serve you here. Perhaps you were ill advised to proceed this way.
The captain of your guard, Ranulf, approaches you.
“Sire, you must leave now, while you have the chance!” he implores your.
“No! I shall not run away like a coward. I shall not! Do you think I have forgotten what happened to my father? Even my own mother thought him a coward for abandoning Antioch. I shall not allow the same to be thought of me.”
“My lord, your father was a brave and noble man, and no man can be ignorant of his valour, not when he gave his life in the end to free the Holy Land of the infidel. Some spoke a harsh and untrue word against him, yet they now surely know the falsehood of their words. But sire, I beg of you, think of your family and your followers. Think of what would happen to them should you this day or be captured. You must save yourself for their sake.”
You remain silent. The enemy knights charge.
“Ready!” you cry.
The knights gallop at you in a confused fashion, arrogantly disdaining a tightly packed formation, as they see no reason why you won’t be as easy prey as the spearmen. The speed of their charge is slightly broken by the mound’s slope, yet the horsemen still crash into your shield wall with a ferocious force, and it at first seems as though your men will give way at any moment. However, the wall begins to stiffen and soon it becomes apparent that the tactic that served King Henry so well at Bremule almost twenty years ago will be equally as successful here. The horsemen desperately try to hack a way through your lines, yet to no avail. They know that the impetus of their charge is lost. The knights withdraw.
The carnage of the short fight is now visible. Bodies of men and horses are strewn all over the slope and rim of the mound in the shape of a gruesome half-moon. Your men also suffered heavy casualties. Of the sixty men your first had, twelve are now dead and six are wounded. The shield wall is now pitifully small, and you know that you cannot hold out for much longer.
“Sire we cannot repulse the enemy many more times.” Ranulf says. “Perhaps once more, but a second charge would surely kill us all. If you remain here, I shall fight on until my last heartbeat and we shall all die. If you depart whilst you have the chance, then we may surrender with the knowledge that our sovereign is safe. I implore you, please think quickly on what you shall do.”
You look at the grim faces of the knights and men-at-arms and contemplate on your captain’s advice. Think of your family. For their sake alone, you cannot abandon them.
You slowly nod your head. Ranulf breathes a sigh of relief. You exchange surcoats with a knight and you are given what little food your men have on them, as well as a small wooden crossbow with a quiver of bolts. A knight leads your horse behind the mound, out of sight of the enemy. You mount your horse.
Ranulf takes your hand and kisses the ring. “May God go with you, my lord.”
“And you,” you reply.
And you spur your steed towards the distant, mist-shrouded woods, unnoticed by the enemy. You dare not approach the stream lest you fall on Miles of Gloucester’s men, so you ride in the direction of Worcester, where you hope to find Robert Beaumont and his men.
As you reach the trees, your rein in your horse. You can still see your men on the mound and your banner in the distance. The banner is lowered, and the knights and men-at-arms kneel in surrender.


You awake early the next morning, huddled under you cloak as you lie on the cold forest floor. Your clothes are damp, your muscles ache and every movement brings a flood of pain. Your stomach rumbles, and you bite into a piece of stale black bread. After finishing your meagre breakfast, you haul yourself up onto your feet. You untie your horse’s tether and wearily pull yourself up into the saddle. You don’t know precisely where you are, you don’t even know in which direction you should ride to reach Worcester. You dare not approach any villages or taverns, lest you fall upon a group of horsemen looking for you, as Miles of Gloucester has surely learnt that you evaded capture.
Nevertheless, you spur you horse on towards where you hope lies Worcester.

You knew you weren’t alone as soon as you had crossed the stream. As much as you twisted around in your saddle, you still couldn’t see anyone in the woods, but an instinct knew there was someone there. You halt your horse and take the crossbow out of your saddlebag. You pull back the bowstring onto the snag and place a bolt on the bow before replacing it in your saddle. You ride on.
As you go down a dip, you hear a rustle of leaves. Two horsemen appear from the trees in front of you, swords drawn. You turn round to see another knight some yards behind you. You rein in your horse once again.
“My lord, if you would be so kind as to drop your sword and any other weapons you may have on you, no harm need come to you,” says one of the knights in front of you. “However, my lord the Earl of Gloucester has given me every licence to take whatever means necessary in…disabling you. Naturally, I hope that you choose the most peaceful method.”
“Indeed I shall,” you reply and pull the crossbow out of the bag and shoot it at the knight. The bolt plunges into his belly and you pull your sword from your scabbard. You charge at the other knight and your swords meet, sliding off each other with a sharp sound. You feint with your sword, then bring it down and thrust it into your opponent’s chest. You charge back down the dip towards the last horsemen. You can tell from the position of his arm that he will make a slash at you head, so you duck at the last minute. The blow passes over you and you swing your sword round into the knight’s unprotected back. The rider cries out in pain, and you stab him in the back to kill him.
You then hear the sound of more horses’ hooves, so you gallop off in the opposite direction. Six more riders appear behind you, and you dig your heels into the horse’s sides to spur it on. You duck as branches whiz past you and hold on to your saddle as it leaps over rotten tree trunks. You turn to look back for a moment, and see that your pursuers are getting closer. You know that you can’t keep ahead for much longer.
You see the end of the trees two hundred yards away and are determined to push on. The nearest of your pursuers is but fifteen yards behind you. After what seems an age, you finally ride through the tree line into the open fields. You can almost hear the rider’s breathing behind you. And then, you see it, one of the most glorious site you have ever seen. An army. Robert of Leicester’s army.
You whoop for joy as your horse thunders across the fields to Leicester’s men. Your pursuers, seeing the army, halt and turn back.
“Halt!” commands one of the knights flanking the column as you approach it.
“Who goes there?” the knight demands.
“I am Stephen, King of England and Duke of Normandy.”

Robert of Leicester has succeeded in raising a force of three hundred and fifty knights and men-at-arms, half of which are mounted. He informs you that Robert of Gloucester has already made for London with two hundred knights. Your brother Henry, Bishop of Winchester, has made for his see, and reports say that he remains in control of both the royal and the Episcopal castles, and most importantly of all, the treasury. Your wife, Queen Maud, far from escaping to her native Boulogne, has ridden with her knights from Kent for London, where she appears to have the overwhelming support of the guilds and the people.

You now have two options.

1. Lead Robert of Leicester’s men towards Monmouth, in the hope of linking up with the Welsh barons’ army, which you were forced to leave the day before. You would then have an army of almost one thousand men. However, you do not know where that army is nor whether or not it has retreated to the Marches, owing to the unresolved situation there. Do not forget that Miles of Gloucester, a most formidable commander, has a force of at least five hundred men and is also near.
2. Take Robert Beaumont’s knights and ride immediately for London, hopefully arriving in time to reinforce your wife against Robert of Gloucester. The men-at-arms would then fall back to Worcester and consolidate your position in the Midlands.

[Csargo]

I am for option 2.

[AntiochusIII]

He's back! Woohoo!

...and that really sucks for us. Our guys are wiped out! Well, at least Stephen proves his mettle with that little encounter.

Now, to the choices:

1) That would allow us, again, to consolidate; albeit with a greater risk than before. I wonder though: how does Gloucester knows your move? Some of the barons must've betrayed us! Ah well, they're far away now. I'm wondering though, would that Welsh border army be adequate for a prolonged fight? And surely that is what Gloucester expects us to do?

2) Very risky, just like this chapter. Gloucester might or might not have a great numerical advantage, but at least there is a measure of support gathering around the queen which, unless we intervene directly, will be squashed in no time. The problem is yet another encounter like that which would royally screw Stephen up.

From my impetuous inconsideration, I choose Choice 2. There's no point "consolidating" while the home base is being overrun. Besides, this make for a more ruthlessly aggressive Interactive History. If Stephen reaches his wife then there's a chance to defeat Gloucester right where we need to: London.

[Ludens]

Both options are risky. Linking up with Marcher Lords gives us greater power, but we don't know where they are and how they will respond to the latest debacle. The alternative leaves us more vulnerable, but it is also unexpected and allows us to protect two important holdings. Therefor, I prefer option 2.


On second thought, isn't Stephen's wife the same Maud that later fought against him? Does any knowledgable member know exactly when she decided to make her own claim? It would be disasterous if we reached London only to find out that Maud has turned against us.