Bill and Bow units of the Wars of the Roses

[Dave Knight]

Did they exist or are they just a wargamers construct?

[Duncan Head]

See the old thread at http://soa.org.uk/sm/index.php?topic=665.0

[Erpingham]

The short answer is we don't know.  There is, as far as I know, only one passage that could be interpreted as evidence, which is the statement that troops before the Battle of Stoke drew up wills bowmen "each with a bill at his back" i.e. behind him.  Taken literally, this would produce alternating ranks of bows and bills i.e. a mixed unit.  It is probably meant more figuratively, though, with each group of bowmen having a group of billmen behind them.  These could also be mixed units, or separate units.

Taking a slightly wider perspective and look either side of the WOTR, there is some discussion about whether HYW retinues of archers and men-at-arms fought together sometimes (Anne Curry mentions this about Agincourt) and also foreign service examples e.g. the co-operation of archers and men-at-arms in the white company, the fact that the Burgundians had mixed pike and archer units and the example of the siege of Loja, where the English contingent definitely formed a mixed MAA archer unit.

By the time we get to the Tudors though, we see units of bills with sleeves of shot, or with shot to the front and flanks.  Is this an innovation based on continental practice.  Or is it an updated version of a standard HYW deployment, with archers deployed in front and on the flanks of the main battles?  If the latter, should we assume continuity through WOTR or could WOTR have used a different deployment method i.e. individual contingents of archers, bills and MAA in mixed retinue based groups?

As I said, classic example of shortage of evidence but no shortage of speculation

[Dave Knight]

I had missed the earlier thread so thanks for the link.

My gut feel is that if there are almost no references to such mixed units then not to use them.

[Erpingham]

My gut feel is that if there are almost no references to such mixed units then not to use them.

I tend to agree.  Certainly, nobody could criticise your conclusion.

[T13A]

Hi

There is a report of a talk given by Rob Jones on Medieval Infantry Tactics at the recent Crusade Wargames Show in Penarth on Jonathan Jones' blog here:

http://jjwargames.blogspot.com/

Not sure if this should be on a different thread but I would like to know if in the WotR 'units' as we know and use them on the wargames table, existed at all? Personally I have my doubts.

Cheers Paul

[Erpingham]

A brave attempt to note down a talk there though at times the recorder perhaps missed some of the subtleties that threaded it together

Rob Jones is a good author, though I can't see much published work on the exact topic he took here, which is a shame.

I think he has a very good point that the main organisational unit of an army was a ward and there was limited independent flexibility of the contingents that made it up.  But was it just a mob?  I doubt it (and I'm sure he does).  Note he doesn't entirely answer the mixed retinue question.  The archers are separated from the MAA in battle but how separated?  Do we imagine contingents merged into two formations, archers and men at arms, with a defined command structure, or a row of loosely connected groups, placing adjacent to one another, each controlling its own archer contingent in front?

I think he has a good point on not thinking of a regular military hierarchy but more a social network in arms.  Major players had wide ranging "affinities" of supporters, some paid (retainers), some connected by other ties, such as land owning and good-lordship.  When a force was mustered, its command and control was built on these social relations.  Local gentlemen would be expected to act as low level leaders, more senior knights or military professionals the more senior roles, nobles the high command roles (perhaps surrounded by professionals and senior knights as "staff").

[Jim Webster]

I think the 'social network in arms' is the core of the issue and I think it's something we struggle with because we don't really have anything similar
I suspect the last gasp of it in our society was probably the WW1 assumption that Public School boys and even Grammar School boys would automatically make good junior officers

[aligern]

Take that to WW2 Jim, where there was some consternation at the need to promote grammar school boys to pilot officers as the RAF suffered casualties and simultaneously expanded.

As to the Wars of the Roses and HYW, can something not be gained by the collection of battlefield incidents? At Towton, for example, it would seem as if both sides had archers to the front when advancing and exchanging arrows and that upon the resumption of movenent the side that had shot off its arrows withdrew its archers whilst the side that had reserved arrow supplies could still shoot?
Roy

[Erpingham]

As to the Wars of the Roses and HYW , can something norpt be gained by the collection of battlefield incidents. At Towton, for example, it would seem as if both sides had archers to the front when advancing and exchanging arrows and that upon the resumption of movenent the side that gad shot off uts arrows withdrew its archer whilst the side that had reserved arrow supplies could still shoot?
Roy

This incident is one of the major supports for sticking the archers in front and the MAA behind.  It does, to me, imply that, at least on the Yorkist side, there was a ward/battle level organisation of the archers (the archers involved were Fauconberg's, from the van) and they were operating as a body, not a group of independent contingents.  However, we don't actually know what happened to the archers after this exchange.  Presumably, they withdrew behind their MAA, to allow the melee to begin.  Then what?  Did they stay as a body?  Were they released back to their own contingents?  Unfortunately, this anecdote is almost alone in describing archer tactics in our records of WOTR, so we can't say it is typical.  It is also a very big battle.  Archers may have fought differently in smaller fights.  The Loja example from 1486, in which the English were a small independent contingent, clearly shows they fought together as a body.

[Jim Webster]

Take that to WW2 Jim, where there was some consternation at the need to promote grammar school boys to pilot officers as the RAF suffered casualties and simultaneously expanded.

the memorial boards for Barrow Boys Grammar School shows just that phenomena, unusually the school lost more old boys in the second war than the first!

[Mark G]

Still tangential, but apparently the liberal RAF recruitment policy extended to all the colonies too, and Became a post war key link to why the wind rush generation came - that often knew an ex RAFer through which the invitations were made...

But back to period