Here we are again. More or less.

I met someone on a battlefield walk at Edgcote this year who told me he was writing a book about the Wars of the Roses. We had a lively discussion about the size of armies in the period, mostly because he  was a proponent of the "Towton is the biggest and bloodiest battle in England" school of thought. Regular readers will know I don't agree, and I've shown my working in other posts. He was an attentive walker, but I don't think he bought a copy of my book at the time.

Fast forward a few months, and a plug for a book pops up on the Northamptonshire Battlefields Society Facebook feed with with the tag line "I love the Wars of the Roses, but I never found it easy to understand...so I wrote this". 

We're not exactly touchy about people posting on our FB page, as long as stuff is relevant. And if you're going to plug a book, then a review copy is a minimum requirement. After all, the appearance is sort of like a endorsement and we like books to say the right things about our battles. Heck, we even got a review copy of Graham Turner's book. Anyway, I commented that we'd like a review copy if he was going to post on our page, and the author said he'd send one when he got his personal supply, which he has now done.

Now we have sort have been here before, when David Cohen published his book on Battles in the Wars of the Roses. He sent me a pdf of the book, and I reviewed it both on the NBS FB page in respect of the county's battles and then in more detail here. This didn't end well, as it wasn't a very good book. The author didn't take it kindly, and banned me from his FB page for life. I didn't get a Christmas card either.

So what of this one?

Okay. Some background. The author has a medical background. Based on his Amazon biog and other comments I think he might be an ex-army medic and is now a trauma nurse. He has a love of history and "has studied the Wars of the Roses for 30 years" (which is a lot more than me). Growing up near Towton he has acted as an "unofficial battlefield guide" for many years. In writing this book he aims to provide  a “detailed history of the period and an in-depth analysis” which will “make the history understandable to the new reader, also offering new perspectives to the experienced historian”. This is a bold move, as he has only allowed himself about 120 pages of A5 text to do so in a fairly large font (I'd guess at 12 point, compared to the normal 10). Add to that he is starting more or less with the death of Henry IV in 1413, to get in the origins story, and that's a big challenge. 

How has that worked out? Well, it's a bit uneven, to be truthful. He takes two chapters and about 1/3rd of the text page count (40 pages) to get to 1st St Albans. That gets a chapter on its own, taking nine pages. The next chapter "St Albans and Towton" covers Blore Heath, Ludford, Northampton and Wakefield in 16 pages of text (you read that right - it does not cover either of the battles in the title of the chapter). Mortimer's Cross, 2nd St Albans, Towton and the conquest of the North get 20 pages. The run up to Edgcote and Losecote are awarded a 16 pages, and the Readeption, Barnet and Tewkesbury are then down to nine. The period up to Edward's death is a three page epilogue, where one of the battles cited on the cover, Bosworth, is given a single paragraph which tells us Richard III was killed there. The author admits he's mainly covering the Wars up to 1471, which means it isn't really a book about the Wars of the Roses.

What ever this book is, it is not "a detailed history of the period".

Does it, then, make the history understandable and offer new perspectives to the experienced historian?

Let's take that last point first. Is there anything here for the "experienced historian"?

Almost certainly not. To make the book accessible there are no footnotes, sources or references. The bibliography lists 36 books, mostly popular histories. It doesn't have a list of primary sources, apparently relying instead on the coffee table book "The Chronicles of the Wars of the Roses" by Elizabeth Hallam, which features snippets from sources, accompanied by a brief essay and colour pictures. Given that most of the Victorian and early 20th century publications by the likes of the Camden Society are available on line for free this is a major oversight. Personally I was very disappointed at the absence of the NBS books on Northampton and Edgcote from the bibliography. To add insult to injury some of the account of the battle of Edgcote comes from my battlefield walk script. It's nice it was remembered. It's a shame I wasn't credited. On the plus side is the inclusion of a book on medieval roads and trackways, which presumably is the source for the discussion of how easy it was to move around on the road network ordered by Edward I and  maintained by monasteries until Henry VIII dissolved them all. I must get a copy.

Whatever Andy's theories are, no matter how clever or ingenious, they are useless unless supported by clear references. And there are some striking claims in the book. Here are two I picked out. There are others, but I didn't start by book marking pages until I was a little way in, and then stopped as there were quite a few things to note.

Page 110: "Warwick had resorted to forging letters in Edward's name". This is quite a thing to have happened, and the text implies it takes place in 1465. It's clearly treasonous. Alas there is no source quoted in the text, so you can't follow up the assertion. This is a nuisance as I'd like to include this in one of my talks, but I can't.

Page 115: "Warwick...had returned to Calais to continue his role as Captain, though this did not stop him corresponding with...John Conyers to create a rebellion in the North of England". Whilst it was the case, we think, that John Conyers raised rebellion on Warwick's behalf, the existence of actual letters between the two ordering the rising would be an important find. Given the nature of the correspondence - which would have been treasonable - Warwick would probably not have written anything down, but used a trusted messenger to deliver his instructions orally.

Even if these were footnoted and verifiable there are too many factual errors elsewhere to allow anyone to take the book seriously as a reference work. These errors include stating Talbot was in Castillon in 1453 and sallied out. He wasn't. He was marching to its relief. In 1459 Warwick and York did not intend to rendezvous at Warwick Castle. They were to meet at Ludlow. William Neville, Lord Fauconberg wasn't Warwick's brother-in-law. He was his uncle. He was York's brother-in-law. Anthony Woodville wasn't created Lord Scales by Edward after his marriage to Elizabeth. He was Lord Scales by right of his wife who he married before Elizabeth married Edward. In 1469, as part of the Redesdale rising, Warwick did not land in Yorkshire on his return from Calais in July, but in Kent on the 13th, and summoned men to meet him in Canterbury. When John Neville was created Lord Montagu, a title with no land it wasn't so he couldn't raise any men. The title conferred status and Edward endowed Montagu with extensive lands in the South West to compensate him and allow him to maintain a lifestyle in accordance with the future father in law of Edward's eldest daughter. In 1471 Margaret of Anjou did not land in Southampton on the 23rd March. She landed at Weymouth on 15th April, the same day as the battle of Barnet.

In addition there are a number of unfortunate typos that make for apparent historical errors, in addition to the one noted above which headed up a chapter incorrectly. Cardinal Beaufort didn't die in 1477 but in 1447. York's son Edmund, wasn't 13 at 1st St Albans and nor was he Earl of March. Edward was. Again, there may be more I have missed. Lancastrian forces at Blore Heath were led by John Tuchet, not John Toucher (auto correct strikes again?). Warwick is said to be accompanied by 20,000 knights at one point, when it probably is supposed to say men-at-arms. There most likely weren't 2,000 knights (as in people who could call themselves Sir and had been knighted) in England at anyone time during the Wars of the Roses.

As to the battle descriptions I think that they don't add anything to our existing knowledge. In respect of Northampton the battlefield is described as being between Delapre and the Hardingstone Cross, with the flanks and rear protected by the river Nene. This is not possible. The battle was fought either between the Abbey and the Cross, or down by the river. It cannot be both. The description of the battle contains a number of statements that are not supported by the evidence. Whilst we know it probably rained on the day of the battle, we have no evidence that the area was turned into “glutinous mud” as the author asserts. The rain may have made the gunpowder damp for the Lancastrians, but the author also says this meant their guns were “stuck”. As they were in a fortification the Lancastrians would not have been trying to move them anyway. On the subject of Grey of Ruthin’s treachery we don’t know why he turned his coat. We cannot say it was because he was offered high office, as Andrew says. It was more likely due to his court case over Ampthill, but we don’t know that for sure either. The note in the introduction of the book says we can’t know how many men fought, but the numbers of 40,000 for the Yorkists and 20,000 for the Lancastrians stated in the text are very unlikely. 

I think Andrew has visited the Northampton battlefield, which makes some of his geographical errors all the more confusing. He could have picked up Mike Ingram’s book on the battle from the Abbey bookshop, but obviously didn't.

Andrew did visit Edgcote on a walk this summer as I said at  the beginning of this post, and we discussed the battle. There are a number of issues with his account.  He has the battle  where we would expect it to be, and most of the account fits with my normal description given on a battlefield walk as I said above, even down to stating Edward was captured at Honiley, a theory I don't think is included in any of the books in the bibliography (again, a footnote would have helped). I would take issue with the suggestion that Herbert’s forces numbered 43,000, and those of you who have read the Society's book or attended one of our lectures on the battle would know why this is the case. The suggestion that the battle left a trail of 3,000 dead is unlikely, given the probable size of the armies was more likely 4-5,000. To say that Edgcote made Warwick’s intentions clear is stretching things a bit, given his publication of his manifesto and his raising of an army a week or two ahead of the battle. It is also incorrect that the Herbert brothers were executed on the same day, as we definitely know they were executed on different days of the week (again, see the appendices to the Society's book on the battle). The author is wrong to say that following the executions that the Earldom of Pembroke "again lay empty" as Sir William Herbert had a son who inherited the title and held some of his father’s offices until removed by Edward IV later in his reign. He seems to forget how inheritance works on several occasions throughout the book.

There's some discussion in the book of the size of armies, and Andy is a proponent of the large numbers school of thought. Unsurprising as he includes both of Andrew Boardman's books on Towton. Paraphrasing Derek Birks, a medieval history podcaster, he says you can "pick any number you like". Derek isn't a military historian, and he hasn't done any work on the sizes of armies, nor on the practicalities of moving them around so I wouldn't be looking to him for guidance.

We've had a good idea of how armies formed up and the space they took since the work of Ferdinand Lot in the 1930s and 40s, and before that there's a good discussion in Ramsey's classic "Lancaster and York" from the 19th century which concludes numbers for Towton are suspect. I've dealt with the Towton numbers in Boardman's book elsewhere and army sizes in general in my Edgcote book. Nothing in this book makes a case to show I'm wrong. The utterly spurious suggestion that 500,000 or more people could camp on Towton field, based on the crowds attending Silverstone does nothing for the case. What's relevant is how armies form up and their frontage, not how many you can cram into a specific area. This is a subject that mainstream academic historians in Britain have historically shied away from, to their eternal shame, taking chronicler numbers at face value as they don't consider it relevant to what they are studying (which is arguably true in a lot of cases). 

So much for the historical side of the book. What about the attempt to write a readable and accessible book to make understanding the period easier? Literary style is a matter of personal preference but basic grammar and spelling underpin readability. Andy has said elsewhere that he worked with an editor, presumably supplied by the publisher. That may explain why the historical issues and typos weren't picked up, as they aren't a specialist history/military book publisher, but should mean that the nuts and bolts of language are in place. 

The editor has failed significantly in this respect. There are many malapropisms throughout the text, possibly caused by auto correct. Otherwise the author (and editor) don't know the difference between accede and concede, for example. Casualty figures are "widely inaccurate" not "wildly". York's death sees "little mourners" rather than "few", implying that his death saddened only short people. A payment of £4,000 is described as an "incitement", not an "inducement". The relationship between Margaret of Anjou and Queen Mary of Scotland 1s a close "allegiance", rather than "alliance" (if you're confused, allegiance implies a hierarchy and the queens would have seen themselves as equals in status). Margaret is said to have been able to "absolve" her alliance with Warwick rather than "dissolve" it. Owen Tudor is "interred" at Windsor Castle rather than "interned". Simple errors like this should never have made it to the final book, nor should they be in such numbers. 

Ultimately the problem here is one that we see elsewhere. Everyone seems to think they can read a book or two and become a historian. That's like putting on a couple of plasters and claiming to be a nurse. I did A Level history, followed by a degree in Medieval and Modern history. I have written one proper history book, and one I would regard as popular history. Yet I hesitate to call myself a historian. Despite having had university training I didn't make it my career. I carried on reading history books and researched to support my wargaming hobby but a "historian"? No. I've done enough proper history to know that I'm not one in the truest sense. Now the word is applied to anyone who says anything about the past. It has become devalued. A historian researches and explains the past. That is more than reading books. "Study" implies some form of focus and purpose. If you read history books for fun (which I heartily applaud) you aren't studying them, same as if you read a fiction book for fun you aren't studying it. There's a difference between reading a novel for entertainment and reading it as part of an English Literature qualification. Andrew hasn't been studying the Wars of the Roses for 30 years. He's been reading history books. That doesn't mean he shouldn't try and write about the period, but he needs support and guidance from people who  have the appropriate skills and not just an echo chamber of friends and family telling everything is brilliant.

In summary, it's a poorly written book with a large number of inaccuracies that fills no apparent purpose, written by someone with no training as a historian. As it is aimed at those with little knowledge of the period you might even argue that it is a positive menace. 

I shan't be buying it for anyone this Christmas.