Alzrius
The EN World kitten
I just finished reading Matthew Bennett's 1991 book Agincourt 1415: Triumph Against the Odds, part of Osprey Publishing's "Campaign" series of books.
I'm a little surprised that I hadn't known about Osprey publishing before I found this at a local used bookseller. I ended up having a very nice conversation with the lady working the counter where she told me about their books, and I told her about Strategy & Tactics magazine.
As it is, I picked this up largely because I'd heard about the Battle of Agincourt before, mostly from this memorable scene in The West Wing:
And as it turns out, pretty much everything John Amos says about Agincourt in that scene is completely wrong, at least according to this book. No mention is made of heralds "picking" the winners. Not only were soldiers (or rather, nobles) who tried to surrender quite often cut down in the heat of battle, but Henry V at one point ordered prisoners to be put to death, shocking and outraging the French. And while it can't be proven conclusively that he was targeted, Henry not only took a notable blow to his helmet in the fighting, but all of his pages were killed, which lends credence to the idea that he was being specifically targeted.
In fact, the most notable takeaway from this book is the degree to which it highlights just how chaotic the entire campaign was, with Agincourt being a microcosm of all the ways in which medieval warfare was apt to go wrong. Henry's siege of Harfleur (near the French coast) was expected to last a few days, but ran much longer than expected. The British then marched around the countryside, trying to find a way to cross the Somme river. The French smartly ruined every crossing they could find, but beyond that didn't seem to know what to do, with the detached force of observers keeping tabs on Henry's army at one point inexplicably pulling back and letting the British operate out of their sight (the prevailing theory is that they were certain Henry was going to attack a nearby town, and were pulling back to join the larger French force).
Agincourt itself is a testament, on the French side, to the perils of lack of clear command structures even in a relatively open area. Despite having the home field advantage (which Henry was aware of, as he was quite nervous about the French navigating through a forest on his flank), the cavalry charged head on at the archers through a field that had become a soggy quagmire, allowing themselves to be easily shot down and routed. They then plunged into their own infantrymen, throwing the lines into disarray, which made the swampy field even harder to navigate. Surprisingly, the British archers joined the melee when the French infantry got close enough, with all accounts (of which there were multiple eyewitness reports, hence why this battle is so well known today) agreeing that their lack of armor helped them navigate the fighting against their exhausted and encumbered opponents.
As for Henry's slaughter of prisoners, the general agreement is that this is the result of a disastrous third sortie by a French commander after most of the fighting had ended. Having taken numerous nobles as prisoners (the French, despite their disastrous defeat, had outnumbered the British by a huge margin), Henry was concerned that a general uprising of prisoners would turn his unexpected victory into a defeat, and so apparently made a controversial call to kill the prisoners his army had taken only a few hours before.
Note that when I refer to a French "commander," I should clarify that the entire French forces were a patchwork collection of nobles, and while there was a nominal leader, most of the nobles commanded their own squadrons as they saw fit. While there was a battle plan in place, once it fell apart there was no one able to regroup the collective force. The entire conflict was practically a comedy of errors on their part.
Now, I have to give the book credit for how clear it made all of the above. In terms of overall clarity and presentation, this book is notable for how concise and to the point it was: it covers the entire topic in less than a hundred pages, with copious illustrations. Even so, I can't help but have a few nitpicks. For instance, it spends several pages presenting the heraldry of the nobles on each side, making sure to describe each shield in its proper heraldic terminology. While I was familiar with that from the heraldry book I'd recently read, I have a hard time seeing that as being anything other than confusing to most readers (even with the abbreviated sidebar about heraldry at the end of the book). Likewise, there was a lot of throwing around names of nobles with little overall context, most of which noted who ransomed or died in the fighting.
Still, those are minor complaints overall. The general presentation of this book was straightforward and easy to read, and it's enough that I'll keep an eye out for Osprey Publishing books from now on.
I'm a little surprised that I hadn't known about Osprey publishing before I found this at a local used bookseller. I ended up having a very nice conversation with the lady working the counter where she told me about their books, and I told her about Strategy & Tactics magazine.
As it is, I picked this up largely because I'd heard about the Battle of Agincourt before, mostly from this memorable scene in The West Wing:
And as it turns out, pretty much everything John Amos says about Agincourt in that scene is completely wrong, at least according to this book. No mention is made of heralds "picking" the winners. Not only were soldiers (or rather, nobles) who tried to surrender quite often cut down in the heat of battle, but Henry V at one point ordered prisoners to be put to death, shocking and outraging the French. And while it can't be proven conclusively that he was targeted, Henry not only took a notable blow to his helmet in the fighting, but all of his pages were killed, which lends credence to the idea that he was being specifically targeted.
In fact, the most notable takeaway from this book is the degree to which it highlights just how chaotic the entire campaign was, with Agincourt being a microcosm of all the ways in which medieval warfare was apt to go wrong. Henry's siege of Harfleur (near the French coast) was expected to last a few days, but ran much longer than expected. The British then marched around the countryside, trying to find a way to cross the Somme river. The French smartly ruined every crossing they could find, but beyond that didn't seem to know what to do, with the detached force of observers keeping tabs on Henry's army at one point inexplicably pulling back and letting the British operate out of their sight (the prevailing theory is that they were certain Henry was going to attack a nearby town, and were pulling back to join the larger French force).
Agincourt itself is a testament, on the French side, to the perils of lack of clear command structures even in a relatively open area. Despite having the home field advantage (which Henry was aware of, as he was quite nervous about the French navigating through a forest on his flank), the cavalry charged head on at the archers through a field that had become a soggy quagmire, allowing themselves to be easily shot down and routed. They then plunged into their own infantrymen, throwing the lines into disarray, which made the swampy field even harder to navigate. Surprisingly, the British archers joined the melee when the French infantry got close enough, with all accounts (of which there were multiple eyewitness reports, hence why this battle is so well known today) agreeing that their lack of armor helped them navigate the fighting against their exhausted and encumbered opponents.
As for Henry's slaughter of prisoners, the general agreement is that this is the result of a disastrous third sortie by a French commander after most of the fighting had ended. Having taken numerous nobles as prisoners (the French, despite their disastrous defeat, had outnumbered the British by a huge margin), Henry was concerned that a general uprising of prisoners would turn his unexpected victory into a defeat, and so apparently made a controversial call to kill the prisoners his army had taken only a few hours before.
Note that when I refer to a French "commander," I should clarify that the entire French forces were a patchwork collection of nobles, and while there was a nominal leader, most of the nobles commanded their own squadrons as they saw fit. While there was a battle plan in place, once it fell apart there was no one able to regroup the collective force. The entire conflict was practically a comedy of errors on their part.
Now, I have to give the book credit for how clear it made all of the above. In terms of overall clarity and presentation, this book is notable for how concise and to the point it was: it covers the entire topic in less than a hundred pages, with copious illustrations. Even so, I can't help but have a few nitpicks. For instance, it spends several pages presenting the heraldry of the nobles on each side, making sure to describe each shield in its proper heraldic terminology. While I was familiar with that from the heraldry book I'd recently read, I have a hard time seeing that as being anything other than confusing to most readers (even with the abbreviated sidebar about heraldry at the end of the book). Likewise, there was a lot of throwing around names of nobles with little overall context, most of which noted who ransomed or died in the fighting.
Still, those are minor complaints overall. The general presentation of this book was straightforward and easy to read, and it's enough that I'll keep an eye out for Osprey Publishing books from now on.
