The Battles of 1066: Fulford, Stamford Bridge and the Battle of Hastings

Planning the invasion

• William of Normandy spent months preparing his invasion across the Channel.
• His barons pledged troops and money in return for the promise of English land once the country was won.
• Pope Alexander II sent a blessed banner, which framed the invasion as a holy cause and helped William recruit beyond Normandy.
• Hundreds of ships were built to carry his army, horses, and supplies, and spies watched the English coast.
• He left Normandy in the hands of his wife Matilda, then waited for calm seas and crossed in late September 1066.
• His careful supply, papal backing, and secure home base let him launch a full invasion at the moment Harold's guard was down.

Harold on the defensive

• Harold Godwinson found England hard to defend against two threats at once.
• Much of his army was the fyrd (the part-time militia of ordinary men called up to fight), but by September these men were needed for the harvest, so he had to send many home.
• His coastal watch along the south coast was expensive to keep up and stretched thin.
• When Harald Hardrada invaded the north, Harold was forced to march away from the Channel just as William was ready to sail.
• Harvest, cost, and the sudden northern threat pulled his defence apart at the worst possible moment.

The northern battles: Fulford and Stamford Bridge

• On 20 September 1066, Harald Hardrada and Harold's exiled brother Tostig beat the northern earls Edwin and Morcar at Fulford, near York, and took the city.
• Harold Godwinson marched over 300 kilometres north in only four days and caught the Norwegians by surprise.
• At Stamford Bridge on 25 September 1066, according to tradition a lone Viking held the bridge until he was killed, after which the English broke the Norwegian line.
• Hardrada and Tostig were both killed, which ended the Viking threat to England for good.
• Harold's victory at Stamford Bridge came at a cost: his elite housecarls (his professional warriors) were badly depleted, and his whole army was left exhausted just as William landed in the south.

The landing at Pevensey

• Three days later, on 28 September 1066, William landed unopposed at Pevensey Bay in Sussex.
• He chose the spot well: the sheltered bay protected his fleet, and the ruined Roman fort of Anderitum gave him ready-made stone walls to fortify quickly.
• He then moved along the coast to Hastings and built a timber castle there as a base.
• His troops raided and burned the nearby villages, provoking Harold into marching south to meet him.
• By landing safely and then provoking the fight, William forced the battle onto ground of his own choosing, before Harold could rest or gather more men.

The Battle of Hastings

• Harold met William on 14 October 1066 at Senlac Hill, near Hastings.
• The English held the ridge behind a shield wall, and the repeated Norman attacks uphill made little headway at first.
• William's advantage was his combined-arms tactics, using cavalry, archers, and infantry together rather than relying on one type of soldier.
• The turning point was the feigned retreat: Norman cavalry pretended to flee, luring parts of the fyrd downhill, then turned and cut them off. Historians debate whether this was a planned trick or a real panic that happened to work.
• As the shield wall thinned, the Normans broke through and Harold was killed, traditionally by an arrow to the eye, which won William the battle, the crown, and control of England.

The 1066 campaign: distances and dates

• Harald Hardrada's Norwegian fleet came in from the North Sea to York, which sits inland in northern England. Fulford (20 September 1066) lies just outside the city, and Stamford Bridge (25 September 1066) just to the east of it.
• Harold marched about 300 km north from London in four days, then roughly 400 km back south to the coast: close to 700 km in under a month, arriving exhausted.
• William's fleet crossed the Channel from Normandy to Pevensey (28 September 1066) on the Sussex coast, then moved a short way east along the coast to Hastings (14 October 1066).