Shrewsbury 1403

Edmund, 5th Earl of Stafford, commanded vanguard of Henry IV's army against Harry Hotspur, was killed during the battle.


The Battle of Shrewsbury, fought on July 21st, 1403 between an army led by the Lancastrian King, Henry IV and a rebel army led by members of the Percy family from Northumberland, is principally remembered today by many as the climax of Shakespeare's play, Henry IV part 1. The Percy forces, mostly raised from their estates in Cheshire, were believed to be aiming to join forces with a Welsh rebel force led by Owain Glyn Dwr. Shrewsbury was a principal town on the route taken by the Percy forces and was the major crossing point over the river Severn as well as a potential supply base. The royal army had to take and defend the site urgently before the Percies and Glyn Dwr could join up. Our knowledge of the battle, the battlefield and the armies is less than complete and even contemporary estimates of the numbers involved or of those slain are very much open to debate.


The Battle of Shrewsbury, fought on July 21st, 1403 between an army led by the Lancastrian King, Henry IV and a rebel army led by members of the Percy family from Northumberland, is principally remembered today by many as the climax of Shakespeare's play, Henry IV part 1. The Percy forces, mostly raised from their estates in Cheshire, were believed to be aiming to join forces with a Welsh rebel force led by Owain Glyn Dwr. Shrewsbury was a principal town on the route taken by the Percy forces and was the major crossing point over the river Severn as well as a potential supply base. The royal army had to take and defend the site urgently before the Percies and Glyn Dwr could join up. Our knowledge of the battle, the battlefield and the armies is less than complete and even contemporary estimates of the numbers involved or of those slain are very much open to debate.

A curious feature of the battle is that only a few years earlier it was the Percy family who had helped the King take the throne from Richard II. The Percy strongholds of the northern borders had not only made them skilled in warfare but also made them sure of their own rights, and they took grave offence when lands in Cumbria which they felt were their reward for helping the King were granted to a rival.

Early in July 1403, Sir Henry Percy rode south to his Cheshire lands with about 200 men, intending to raise a large force, including numbers of Welsh archers. By July 12th, the King was en route to face the threat when he heard whilst at Nottingham of the Percy forces actions. He immediately turned via Burton on Trent and Lichfield preparing to take the field wherever it became necessary. The Percy forces were somewhat deflated when the hoped for Welsh support failed to materialise and only physical and moral pressure induced many of them to stay with the army.

Both armies arrived in the vicinity of Shrewsbury from opposite directions a day or so before the battle. The Percy forces encamped around Berwick to the north west of the town., whilst the King's forces lay in wait to the north east around Haughmond. During the night of the 20th, the royal forces began the crossing of the Severn at Uffington and took the field below Haughmond Abbey. This gave them the wider ground on which their superior numbers could be brought to best use. The Percy army was forced to take the field on unfavourable ground and although the Percy's had greater military experience than the King, many of their troops did not. Numbers given for the combatants range from 60,000 - 14,000 Royalists and 20,000 - 5,000 rebels.

For some hours on the morning of the 21st, the two armies faced each other out of arrowshot whilst negotiations took place to try to resolve the position. Eventually, the King seems to have decided that no solution would be reached since the Percies were either too determined in their stance or because they were seeking to bring in surprise reinforcements. The order to advance was given.

Both vanguards found themselves subject to such a bombardment of arrows that many were killed within minutes. Once the hand to hand fighting had begun, the royal forces proved superior and a rash charge from the Percy force led them into disarray and destruction. When the cry went up that Harry Percy (Hotspur) had fallen, resistance crumbled and the slaughter began. Chroniclers of the day recorded that such a slaughter had never been seen or read about in Christian times. Thousands fell.

Both sides suffered tremendous casualties, many as the result of the dramatic impact of the use of the English longbow, whose archers were reputed to be able to fire 12 arrows a minute into the enemy ranks - as there were several thousand archers in each force, the prospect is awe inspiring.

Over 300 knights of the realm perished or died of their wounds, up to 20,000 men fell on the field and many thousands succumbed to their injuries over the ensuing weeks. Many of the bodies were gathered for decent burial by relatives or kinsmen but it is reputed that some 1500 bodies were buried in a great charnel somewhere on the site of the battle. Hotspur was initially buried at Whitchurch, Shropshire, but the King ordered him disinterred and displayed to prove he was truly dead. His body was set up in Shrewsbury impaled on a spear between two millstones and was later quartered and put on show in the four corners of the country. In November they were returned to his widow who had them buried in the Percy chapel of Beverly Minster.

In 1406, Sir Roger Hussey, whose manor lay close by erected a chantry chapel and college of priests on the battlefield to pray for the fallen. The church of St Mary Magdalen survives to this day as a lasting memorial to this critical moment in English and international history and warfare.