| The
strategies employed by both sides in the Scottish Wars of Independence
were incredibly in depth and complex. This page will only scratch
the surface of the strategy used by both sides, and only that in a
few of the battles. The first major battle that the two sides participated
in was the battle of Stirling
Bridge. In this battle, the English really did not have a strategy,
as the waves of English troops came across Stirling Bridge in groups
of no more than ten per row, and those ten did not stand a chance
against the entire Scottish army. The English actually could have
crossed the river at a wide, shallow ford about 2 miles north of the
battle site, but their leader decided against it. It is unsure why
he decided against this, but some people suspect that is was because
he did not want to waste the energy of his troops. This was not one
of the best examples of the strategy of the English army, as they
were beaten badly despite having nearly three times as many troops
as the Scots. Scotland, on the other hand, had an incredible strategy.
They would wait behind a hill near the bridge until the English first
came over, then they would kill the troops. Finally, when they had
made so much noise that the English had heard them, they rushed the
bridge and started attacking the people that came over the bridge.
The English tried to retreat, but they could not because of all of
the oncoming troops. Eventually they were able to call a retreat,
and lost the battle with over 1,000 dead on the field. In the battle of Falkirk, both sides had rather good strategies, but in my mind the Scots had a better one. I say this because even though they lost the battle, they had less than half as many troops as the English and still were able to make a good stand. Not only that, but many of his troops deserted him in the middle of the battle. The English had a strategy that involved lining up in three columns with a leader at the head of each column. Then one column at a time would charge until they were making no progress. When this happened, that column would back off and another one would charge until they made no progress, and so on and so forth. Scotland had four tightly packed groups, with spearmen at the outside so that the English could not penetrate into the center. They also had secret Welsh longbowmen at the back of their groups who would pop out and fight if the English got too close to the Scottish army, or if they were able to break through the original archers. The Scots also had spearmen that would break off from the rest of the army and form tight circles that would run around and try to distract the English. In the actual battle, the Scots were doing very well and it appeared that they were going to drive the English back. Then, Sir John Comyn took his entire force off of the battlefield, leaving the Scots with almost 2,000 fewer men. At that point, it was evident that Scotland was going to lose the battle. Through all of the battles, my opinion is that Scotland had tactics that were far superior to England's. Even though they had inferior numbers to England, they still won the battle of Stirling Bridge and would have won the battle of Falkirk if John Comyn had not deserted them. |