Battle Of Flodden Field

[Maggie/915]

500 years in September I believe.

Some of our ancestors must have been there.

[tonyg]

Flodden Field; a few hundred yards south of the village of Branxton . is the scene of battle in which between 9000 and 16,000 scottish and English

soldiers were killed

[tonyg]

A narrow road from Branxton church leads to the Monument, it is said to mark the spot where James the Fourth was slain. in 1513. the English soldiers were led by the Earl of Surrey.

[Keith Scantlebury]

At least they had the decency to keep off the A697, could you imagine the disruption to traffic with all that fighting and bludgeoning going on. Some of them were walking home across the fields to Yetholm after a darts match in the Red Lion at Millfield when they got jumped on by some Jocks who had been slung off the bus on their way from Coldstream to Wooler.

[Maggie/915]

Keith your talents are wasted.

[Maggie/915]

I think today 500 years ago, the battle took place.

What a waste of life.

Something to remember today, when there is talk of battle or intervention.

[Symptoms]

The school trips to Ford Castle in the 60s always included sessions on the battle. The boss gadgy at Ford always told us kids that James's ghost used to roam the corridors at night ... I'm sure it was just a typical teacher under-hand trick to keep us in our dormitories at night as I never saw the ghost.

[threegee]

A narrow road from Branxton church leads to the Monument, it is said to mark the spot where James the Fourth was slain. in 1513. the English soldiers were led by the Earl of Surrey.

Ah, yes: https://maps.google....t=h&mra=ls&z=17 I remember it well.

The near exact spot where I almost ended up in a crumpled mass of metal some time circa 1972. The only time I momentarily lost control of an aircraft at raa..ther low-level, but even now hesitate to tell the tale...! :D The incident had nothing to do with Flodden Field as such, it just happened to be an awkward rise in quite the wrong place.

I wonder if that burn to the North West is where the Scots pikemen got bogged down - which is reported to have determine the battle (and the history of England/Scotland)?

BTW you can zoom in to road level from that link, if you place the little mannie first.

[Malcolm Robinson]

"The only time I momentarily lost control of an aircraft........"

And here's us thinking you are a space cadet GGG!

[threegee]

Nope, I flunked the flying-saucer handling test - somewhere near the Market Place!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/521441.stm

[Maggie/915]

The Bedlington History Society on Monday featured the Battle of Flodden and the background to the event by a guy called Chris Burgess.

He was an excellent speaker and it was a talk everyone with any interest in history should have attended.

Sorry, due to a technical hitch I could not mention it sooner.

[HIGH PIT WILMA]

It was said in documents I have read,that the field ran with blood every time it was ploughed over,for years after the massacre.

Like Maggie said,[as with every war],such a sad waste of life.

[Malcolm Robinson]

Maggie,

Is that Chris Burgess the archaeologist?

Also NCC conservation officer.

[Maggie/915]

Yes I believe it is, his presentation was excellent.

He provided a thought provoking insight into the subject.

Tactics as well as Time and Place.

He even found time for the Old Alliance!

[Symptoms]

Maggs wrote: "Some of our ancestors must have been there."

I've recently been doing a load of family tree research and have found two of my ancestors who were killed at Flodden:

Sir John Semple my 17x Grandfather

Sir Robert Colville my 18x Grandfather

both buried at Branxton.  Not father and son but father-in-law and son-in-law.

[HIGH PIT WILMA]

Sym,ya probably sitting on a Scottish Mansion somewhere.....Laird Sym!!

My Mother told me before she passed on,that my 5x Grandfather was a Scottish Laird.no more details to be found on that one.

Maybe that's why I have been pulled to Scotland all my adult life,firstly for my Honeymoon in 1967,then forever more,every year,three times a year,until my Wife's ill-health meant we could no longer travel so far.

Even Wooler,every weekend up the Cheviots with our tourer,for over 20 years,walking them thar hills from sometimes 5-am [sun-up],till 11-0pm..[sun down]!!

Ye canna imagine a scene of so much blood and death in so small an area,I've been there many many times,and often wondered what could be found with a good metal detector!

We used ti love watching the old bus towing GGG's marra's up owa the top of the Yeavering Bell,and breaking away wi a characteristic drop in revs,and a roll to Port!!!

Did I get that yin reet or hev a med an A.....e o' mesen?

It wudna hae been ye,GGG ....wud it?....spoiling the tranquility of a Sunday afternoon..!!

We went from 1977-ish on,then withoot the van,just for a day noo and then,up ti thi present time.

Edited February 12, 2017 by HIGH PIT WILMA
Additional comment

[Symptoms]

Just try to imagine what it must have been like back then ... charging with pike or sword and trying to chop the other fella to bits!  Until recently the only references we had about what it must have been like were all those sanitized Hollywood movies, until, until, until ... The Battle of the Bastards episode in of Game of Thrones.  My God, that had to be what it was like!  For those who haven't seen it search it out on the internet (it must be there somewhere).

HPW - Yep, Ye Olde Sym has plenty of Jocko ancestry all who lived in various castles.  For most folks you usually can't research further back than circa 1800ish because for the masses nothing was written down about them. If there's a nob in the family then it's a huge game changer ... just like horse breeding EVERYTHING was recorded.  You wouldn't believe just how far back the Syms go.

[HIGH PIT WILMA]

Templars....?!........maybe....eh Sym?!!.......

[mercuryg]

9 hours ago, HIGH PIT WILMA said:

Templars....?!........maybe....eh Sym?!!.......

There are Templar connections not far from here; check out the chapel at Delaval Hall, a very interesting building indeed.

[Maggie/915]

Roslyn Chapel is the place to visit.

It looks like an old barn but is a stone masons dream.

Ancestry is addictive .

From the old days and micro film it is easy to link with other research .

[Symptoms]

HPW wrote: " Templars....?!........maybe....eh Sym?!!....... "

Yep, all those fellas and much further back ...

Mind, the other strands on Sym's bloodline don't make for happy reading ... escape from the Irish Potato famine to work in the Cumbrian iron ore mines, deaths in those pits, walking over the Pennines for work in the Durham coal fields when the iron ore ran out.  Others were the Jocko fishermen from the Outer Hebrides settling in Shields.

The real nightmare for Sym is all that Jocko blood flowing though his tubes with the only relief being that it's been diluted by Norman juices from "1066 and all that".  Some amazing characters have cropped-up in the Sym Saga and there's still more to do.

Maggs, you're right, once you start you can't stop the research. 

Edited February 17, 2017 by Symptoms

[HIGH PIT WILMA]

Wow,Sym! Ye bugga,this is mair interesting than bliddy pitwark! Tellis mair!

[Maggie/915]

Have you thought about doing a DNA test Symptoms.

It shows details of origin and can be very interesting.

Scottish Island life , I can recommend .

The scenery from Ullapool taking in the Summer Islands and out to Lewis is so beautiful.

[Symptoms]

Maggs - I'll not be getting my juices tested 'cos I'm sure that at some stage the Peelers will hack into those Ancestry DNA results and Sym'll get his 'collar felt' and 'fitted-up' for some bank job back in the 70s.  I'll break under questioning as the phone book is being applied to my lugholes and name Maggs as the 'brains' behind the operation and HPW as the getaway driver. 

[HIGH PIT WILMA]

Heh heh!! Creasing me up ye aad bugga!!.........."Get Maggs and H.P.W." .....Opening soon at selected venues!![er....!!........div a need ti explain it...or hev a spoilt it by sa'in' "div a need ti explain it?!!]...a passing thought..Gud job Sym got it in thi reet order or we wud aal be in thi nick in nae time..heh heh!!

Noo wi knaa why aad Sym defected!!

[Mind,hoo aam aa ti taak....tha's a dark side ti me an aal!.....a once got caught by the forst copper-car-cops in Bedlington,wi a baigie under me jumper for me Mutha ti

mek thi Sundi dinna wi..as laddies did in 1954....at ten ya aad!!![Hard-up laddies that is!]