Battle of Stirling Bridge

The **Battle of Stirling Bridge** was a battle of the First War of Scottish Independence. On 11 September 1297, the forces of Andrew Moray and William Wallace defeated the combined English forces of John de Warenne, 6th Earl of Surrey, and Hugh de Cressingham near Stirling, on the River Forth.

## Background

The Earl of Surrey had won a victory over the aristocracy of Scotland at the Battle of Dunbar. However, by August 1297 Moray and Wallace controlled almost all of Scotland north of the Forth, except for Dundee. Surrey marched north with an army from Berwick to relieve Dundee. The town of Stirling was the key entry point to the north of Scotland.

## The Main Battle

The earl arrived at the narrow, wooden bridge over the River Forth near Stirling Castle and determined that he would be at a tactical disadvantage if he attempted take his main force across there. So he delayed crossing for several days to allow for negotiations, and to reconnoiter the area. On 10 September Warenne gave orders to cross the river the next day. At dawn the English and Welsh infantry started to cross only to be recalled due to the fact that Warenne had overslept.

The Scots arrived first and encamped on Abbey Craig which dominated the soft, flat ground north of the river. The English force of English, Welsh and Scots knights, bowmen and foot soldiers camped to the south of the river. Sir Richard Lundie, a Scots knight who joined the English after the Capitulation of Irvine, offered to outflank the enemy by leading a cavalry force over a ford two miles upstream, where sixty horsemen could cross at the same time. Hugh Cressingham, King Edward's treasurer in Scotland, persuaded the Earl to reject this advice and order a direct attack across the bridge.

The small bridge was only broad enough to allow two horsemen to cross abreast, but offered the safest river crossing as the Forth widened to the east and the marshland of Flanders Moss lay to the west.[4] The Scots waited as the English knights and infantry made their slow progress across the bridge on the morning of 11 September. It would have taken several hours for the entire English army to cross

Wallace and Moray waited, according to the Chronicle of Hemingburgh, until "as many of the enemy had come over as they believed they could overcome". When a substantial number of the troops had crossed (possibly about 2,000) the attack was ordered. The Scots spearmen came down from the high ground in rapid advance and fended off a charge by the English heavy cavalry before counterattacking the English infantry. They gained control of the east side of the bridge, and cut off the chance of English reinforcements to cross. Caught on the low ground in the loop of the river with no chance of relief or of retreat, most of the outnumbered English on the east side were probably killed. A few hundred may have escaped by swimming across the river.

Surrey, who was left with a pitiful contingent of archers, had remained to the south of the river and was still in a strong position. The bulk of his army remained intact and he could have held the line of the Forth, denying the triumphant Scots a passage to the south, but his confidence was gone. After the escape of Sir Marmaduke Tweng, an English knight from Yorkshire, Surrey ordered the bridge's destruction and retreated towards Berwick, leaving the garrison at Stirling Castle isolated and abandoning the Lowlands to the rebels. James Stewart, the High Steward of Scotland, and Malcolm, Earl of Lennox, whose forces had been part of Surrey's army, observing the carnage to the north of the bridge, withdrew. Then the English supply train was attacked at *The Pows*, a wooded marshy area, by James Stewart and the other Scots lords, killing many of the fleeing soldiers.

## Aftermath

The Battle of Stirling Bridge was a shattering defeat for the English: it showed that under certain circumstances infantry could be superior to cavalry. It was some time, though, before this lesson was fully absorbed.

Contemporary English chronicler Walter of Guisborough recorded the English losses in the battle as 100 cavalry and 5,000 infantry killed. Scottish casualties in the battle are unrecorded, with the exception of Andrew Moray. He appears to have been injured in the battle and died of his injuries around November.

Hugh de Cressingham's body was reportedly subsequently flayed and the skin cut into small pieces for souvenirs of the victory. The Lanercost Chronicle records that Wallace had "a broad strip [of Cressingham’s skin]...taken from the head to the heel, to make therewith a baldrick for his sword".

Wallace went on to lead a destructive raid into northern England which did little to advance the Scots objectives,[*citation needed*] however the raids frightened the English army and stalled their advance. By March 1298 he had emerged as Guardian of Scotland. His glory was brief, for King Edward himself was coming north from Flanders. The two men finally met on the field of Falkirk in the summer of 1298, where Wallace was defeated.