Worth Remembering is a dive into the history of Stirling, Scotland and beyond. Looking at everything from legendary battles to old folktales, because every story is worth remembering.
It’s an iconic image; The arrogant English army tries to cross a rickety bridge and the Scots triumphantly charge down on them. The bridge collapses and the day is won.
The Image of Wallace’s legendary battle has been in the Scottish mind for centuries, immortalised in the movie Braveheart and the Wallace Monument which watches over Stirling rather than one of his many (supposed) birthplaces.
It’s a point of Scottish pride and has become ingrained in Stirling’s local history where you can find countless monuments and memorials to the battle well over 700 years later.
But when legend and history collide, things get fuzzy. The truth about the Battle of Stirling Bridge is that it didn’t quite happen in the way you were told and wasn’t as significant as the legend would have you believe.
So let’s untangle fact from fiction and discuss what we know about the history of Scotland’s most famous battle. But don’t worry, even without the exaggerated mythology, it was still an incredible battle.
Background to the Battle
First things first, that isn’t Stirling Bridge, that’s a stone bridge built in the 15/16th century called “Stirling Old Bridge”. It was built to replace the numerous wooden bridges over the Forth, including the one the battle was fought on. The actual Stirling bridge was just under 100m to the north though so it serves as a good representation of its location.
Now that we’ve cleared up that misconception, we can give an abridged (Pun intended) history of why the battle occurred in the first place.
Edward I was attempting to take over Scotland and had, at this point, asserted direct control over the kingdom, ruling over it as though it were merely a part of England. Naturally, this was highly unpopular with the locals. Two locals it was especially unpopular with were William Wallace and Andrew Moray who had launched rebellions against the English regime in 1297. They wreaked havoc in Central Scotland and the Highlands respectively.
An English army was assembled to crush the rebellion and so Wallace and Moray decided to lead a joint-army at Stirling to prevent the English from crossing into the highlands, where the rebellion was largely centralised.
Stirling’s reputation as the “Gateway to the highlands” is well-known and it was particularly true during the medieval period. That was both because people actually lived in the highlands back then but also because the geography of Scotland was a lot more limiting.
To the west, the highlands were dense with mountains and almost impossible to travel. To the East, the river forth widened greatly so as to become uncrossable. Stirling thus became majorly strategically important as one of the sole crossing points into the north.
An important thing to note here is that William Wallace is something of a nobody at this point. His exact background is unknown but we do know that he was from a minor noble family and that he often collaborated with more important nobles in his military career.
All that is to say that there’s significant evidence that William Wallace may have been a mere junior partner in a battle largely masterminded by Andrew Moray. Ironic, given the fact that Andrew Moray is largely forgotten in today’s history.
John Warrene, the earl of Surrey and the man who’s been assigned by Edward to deal with the mess that is Scotland, arrives with his army on September 10, 1297. Wallace and Moray abandon their siege at Dundee and take positions on the other side of the river. The stage was set for the battle of legends.
The Two Armies
Let’s look at what we know of the combatants. On both sides the commanders were relatively inexperienced. Wallace and Moray so far had been running a guerilla campaign and had never fought a real medieval battle. John Warrenne had only fought one: The Battle of Dunbar.
Dunbar was a decisive English victory against the Scottish nobility but it is generally believed to have been a relatively minor battle involving few troops. It was his success here that propelled John Warrene to become the Guardian of Scotland and no doubt it severely bolstered his arrogance towards the Scots.
He had reason to be confident. His troops were veterans while the Scots army was made up of inexperienced men Wallace and Moray had been able to raise during their rebellions.
However the amount of English troops is often heavily exaggerated in accounts of the battle. While it is believed that the English did outnumber the Scots, it hardly would have been by much. At the time, England was involved in a war against France and the troops for such a massive army, as is often depicted, couldn’t be spared.
And so, the English were confident. After all, they had crushed one Scot’s rebellion at the Battle of Dunbar, they could certainly do it again here. If Wallace and Moray were to win the battle, they needed strategy and to use the lay of the land to their advantage.
The Scots are naturally on the defensive here. They have no need to cross this bridge but the English do. And so on the cold morning of September 11, 1297, the Battle of Stirling Bridge begins.
The Battle of Stirling Bridge
The bridge is very narrow. Described as only fitting two horsemen or three soldiers abreast, it will take a very long time to cross. Slow columns of English troops begin to march over the river, with hundreds and possibly thousands passing over to the other side.
That is, until they realise that John Warenne isn’t awake yet and they have to go back and attempt to cross again.
This time the advance gets even less far because of the arrival of two traitorous Scottish nobles who suggest that Wallace and Moray may be open to peace. Wallace tells Warenne that “We are not here to make peace but to do battle to defend ourselves and liberate our kingdom”
So the English, for the third time that morning, crossed the bridge and when a suitable number had made it to the far bank, the Scots charged.
What happens from here is a bit of a blur but we certainly know it was an absolute slaughter for the troops that had made it to the other side. They were quickly overrun and left trapped by the course of the river.
We know that the bridge was cut off and here lies one of the great mysteries of the battle, often ignored in many retellings. The truth is that we really don’t know how the bridge was destroyed.
Blind Harry, the man who is largely responsible for Wallace’s current fame, tells a fantastical tale. A man named John Wright was tasked with removing pins from the bridge in order to collapse it. Naturally this seems unlikely and so do most stories of potential Scots sabotage.
Some would say there was a more natural collapse of the bridge, under the weight of the English army. But thousands of troops had been crossing the bridge all morning (Multiple times even) and so for the bridge to collapse so suddenly also feels unrealistic.
The most likely explanation we can say is that the Scots managed to cut off access to the Bridge, preventing more troops from crossing the Forth and trapping the soldiers who had. Troops attempted to swim across the river but most failed and were cut down.
The majority of the English army remained intact because most of them had not crossed the bridge. But the sheer success of the Scots strategy made Warrene retreat where Walter of Guisborough (An English chronicler) claims that Warrene pulled down the bridge to prevent the Scots from pursuing.
The battle was won! Moray and Wallace were elevated to living legends and both made commanders of the armies of Scotland thanks to their victory. However, Moray would soon die of wounds he sustained at the battle, leaving Wallace as the Guardian of Scotland.
Their brilliant strategy had carried the day and the English had retreated. Scotland was secure. But it’s here that I have to be really disappointing. Stirling Bridge was flashy and it was impressive. I’ll even admit that it was brilliant of the Scots. But the victory simply did not last.
The impacts of the Battle
The battle did aid the war effort. The English baggage train (Supplies for the army I.e food, money and weapons) had been left unguarded and provided a major boost to the Scots. It left Stirling castle open to siege which the Scots took later that year and it paved the way for the rebellion to expand into lowlands.
But it had also led to one of the most successful commanders of the rebellion being killed and left William Wallace in charge. They had prevented the English from crossing but what was to stop the English coming back with another army?
It was a humiliating defeat for the English but it was not a costly one. As mentioned earlier, most of Warrene’s troops never made the crossing and that allowed the English to regroup and come back even stronger.
That humiliation woke up the English as well. They were largely dismissive of Scottish unrest up until this point but the battle showed them that the Scots needed to be taken seriously. Thus, the blundering response of John Warrene was soon replaced by the wrath of King Edward I, personally leading an army to crush the rebellion.
The Scots got cocky too, especially William Wallace. Though he is a legend, Stirling Bridge was the first and only battle he won. He was an ineffective and arrogant military commander, something that could clearly be seen as his disastrous decision to stand and fight at the Battle of Falkirk.
At that battle, the English did massively outnumber the Scots, as well as having cavalry and archers that decimated the Scottish ranks. The Scots lost the battle so badly that it not only undid any progress from the Battle of Stirling Bridge but effectively ended the entire rebellion for another 8 years.
That was until Robert the Bruce came into the picture but you all know the story there.
Should we still remember Stirling Bridge?
No doubt about it, the Battle of Stirling Bridge is one of the most mythologised events in Scottish history. It’s easy to see why: It’s flashy and it’s easy to understand and imagine. The image of the bridge collapsing and English soldiers falling has endured for a reason.
It was the battle that made William Wallace a worldwide legend. The truth is however, Stirling Bridge was an unbelievably cool but very small victory. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t important.
It was the first victory of the First Scottish War of Independence. It bolstered the spirits of Scotland and it still serves as a national symbol even to this day. Though it could be argued to have led to military failures down the road, can we really say that these were the fault of the Battle?
So now that we’ve nuanced the story, we can see that Stirling Bridge was still a proud moment in Scottish history. Even if the legends and stories aren’t quite accurate, it’s still worth remembering. Just remembered truthfully.
Featured Image Credit: Robert Murray via Wikimedia Commons
Sources and Further reading:
Under the Hammer by Fiona Watson
Freedom’s Sword by Peter Traquair
1st year Journalism and History Student
I have no accolades but I write okay, I think.
