Probably, regular readers of VO have already noticed that from time to time articles appear here about castles located sometimes in the most amazing places, and each of them has its own story. Some castle is famous for its architecture, some have such a bloody history that the blood literally freezes in their veins, and some are just beautiful and original. Several times the readers of these materials expressed their wishes to pay more attention to the "combat history" of this or that castle, and why this is so is understandable. Understandable, but not always achievable. Very often in the descriptions of castles there are such phrases: "was besieged", "was taken", but how the siege took place and how it was taken, history, alas, is silent.
Here is all that remains of St Andrews Castle today.
However, there is a castle in the same England, the battles for which in English sources are described in great detail, although this castle itself today is just a pile of ruins. This is St Andrews Castle, located in the town of the same name, home to the oldest university in Scotland, founded in 1403. A third of the city's population today are students, and the rest leases them rooms and serves them. The city itself is also very ancient. In any case, it is known that the construction of the new Cathedral of St. Andrew began in it in 1158 (and the old one was built there long before that!), But it was consecrated only in the XIV century already under King Robert the Bruce. Why so long? Yes, because the size of this cathedral for those times is simply amazing.
And this is what remains of St. Andrew's Cathedral. Nearby is the Tower of St. Regula - even more ancient than the cathedral itself, but still preserved to this day.
View of the city of St. Andrews, the castle and the ruins of the cathedral from the tower of St. Regula.
Remains of one of the walls of St Andrews Cathedral. Truly, this would be the decoration of this city and the entire local coastline!
The relics of St. Andrew were also kept here, but during the Reformation it was destroyed, and the relics were lost (in a word, everything happened as it was shown in the Soviet film "The Last Relic"!), And now only ruins remain in its place, even from them you can tell how magnificent this building was at that time far from us. Correspondingly, the castle located literally opposite this cathedral, located on the sea coast, was powerful and well fortified …
Well, the siege and the battle for St. Andrews Castle took place in 1546 - 1547. and followed the assassination of Cardinal Beaton in him by a group of Protestant radicals. After that, for some reason, they remained in the castle and were besieged by the governor of Scotland, Arran. The siege continued for 18 months until the castle finally surrendered to a French squadron after a fierce artillery bombardment. The Protestant garrison, including the Protestant preacher John Knox, was taken to France and decided to be used as slaves … in galleys.
In order to avoid accidents, fences are installed everywhere in the castle.
Well, before that, St. Andrews Castle was the residence of Cardinal David Beaton and his mistress Marion Ogilvy. Moreover, Beaton, who had considerable power, was against the marriage of Mary Stuart with Prince Edward, who later became King of England Edward VI. Henry VIII did not like this, and he found people ready … to remove the cardinal from the political arena! Well, his ambassador to Scotland, Ralph Zadler, was looking for them, offering to either capture or simply kill the intractable cardinal.
The territory of the castle is not large at all and it is simply not clear how quite a rather large garrison was in it for 18 months.
On Saturday, May 29, 1546, the conspirators split into four groups. Five people disguised themselves as masons and made their way into the castle. The main conspirator James Melville also ended up in the castle to arrange a meeting with the cardinal. William Kirkcaldy of Grange and eight others entered the castle via a drawbridge, where they were joined by a certain John Leslie of Parkhill. That is, there were a lot of conspirators. Together they overpowered the guard Ambrose Stirling, stabbed him and threw the corpse into the ditch.
They then broke into the inner chambers of the castle, where Peter Carmichael struck the cardinal in his room or on the spiral staircase in the east tower of the castle. In order to keep the cardinal's supporters in the city, led by James Lermont from Darzi, from attempting an attack, they hung the body of the murdered man so that it could be clearly seen.
The coat of arms of Cardinal Beaton, discovered in one of the chambers of the castle.
Further, the conspirators, for some reason, sprinkled Beaton's body with salt, wrapped it in lead and buried it in the sea opposite the castle tower. And immediately a legend arose about the ghost of the cardinal, wandering at night in the basements of the castle. An unclean conscience, she is always looking for an excuse …
The Governor of Arran was at this time engaged in the siege of Dumbarton Castle in the west of Scotland, which he took on July 8, 1546.
Then the Scottish Parliament in Sterling on June 11, 1546, issued a proclamation forbidding the help of the murderers who settled in this castle. Well, and those, according to the local chronicles that have come down to us, were engaged in robbing local residents, burning their houses and “using their bodies in fornication with righteous women” - such an English phrase as heavy as a cobblestone, similar to the well-known example “I have a dog"). Meanwhile, Arran began to prepare for the siege of the castle. Monasteries in Scotland were ordered to pay a tax of £ 6,000 to cover the costs of its restoration, as it was evident that it would be severely affected by the fighting. In addition, Norman Leslie and Kirkcaldy of Grange, along with all their accomplices, were excommunicated for the murder of the cardinal from the church. On November 23, a copy of this "great slander" against the murderers was delivered to the castle, so that they change their minds and surrender.
Castle at low tide.
In October 1546, Arran's forces approached St. Andrews and the siege began in earnest. It was decided to dig a tunnel under the Fore tower and blow it up. The French ambassador Odet de Selve, who was in the camp of the besiegers, reported on November 10 that it had been dug for 18 days. But the defenders of the castle dug a counter course! Despite the fact that it was necessary to dig hard rocks, the tunnels were dug and, moreover, they met underground! Then they were reopened in 1879 and today they remain open to tourists as an example of ancient military engineering art. Moreover, the defenders of the castle dug not one, but as many as three tunnels before they got to the attackers and successfully blew up the countermine.
This is how it looks in winter.
Arran's artillery consisted of cannons that had their own names: "Crook-mow" and "Thrawynmouthe" (these are strange names, and who else would know what they mean), and a gun with a more understandable name "Deaf Mag". The fire on the castle continued until nightfall, and its defenders also fired back, and in doing so they killed the royal gunner John Borthwick, the master artilleryman Argyll and several other gunners. After two days of continuous casualties among his gunners, Arran refused to fire at the castle.
These cannons were also fired at that time, only they stood on carriages. A still from the film "The Last Relic". And there is also a wonderful phrase by Roman Bykov: "Men are men!"
In November, he learned that the English army was on its way to help the defenders of the castle, so he ordered the clans under his command to bring their people out to sea and resist the British invasion. However, the fact that the castle was on the seashore helped to supply it even without the help of English ships. For example, 60 lead cores cast from lead from the roofs of the allies of the castle defenders were transported there by boats. Food supplies were delivered in this way, but nevertheless Walter Melville and twenty other people at the castle died from poor nutrition and stale fish.
Photo of the castle of the early twentieth century. Paul Getty Museum.
But then there was a personal request from Henry VIII (he wrote a letter to Arran on December 20, 1546, asking him to abandon the siege) to end hostilities, and Leslie and William Kirkaldy were each given £ 100 from the Privy Council of England. According to the king, the people besieged in the castle were his friends and "well-wishers to English marriage."
The request of a king like Henry VIII is almost an order, even if he was a foreign monarch. And on December 18, 1546, an armistice was signed, according to which the besieged in the castle were supposed to remain there, awaiting absolution from the Pope of sins for murder, and then they would be allowed to surrender it on good terms. As a pledge of goodwill, the beleaguered Protestants sent two hostages to Arran, the two younger sons of the Grange family, and Lord Ruthven's brother, who were brought to Kingorn on 20 December.
Castle gate. Inside view.
Two Italian military engineers also came to the aid of the besieged from Henry VIII: Guillaume de Rosetti and Angelo Arkano. After Henry's death on January 27, 1547, his son Edward VI decided not to send armed aid to the besieged. True, British ships brought them weapons and ammunition, but St. Andrews was blocked from the sea by the Scottish Navy and help did not reach them. But the besieged offered to send a letter to the Pope so that he … would not forgive them! Then, they say, we will have to sit in this castle further, which sooner or later will force the British to help them, because they are brothers in faith!
The same tower with a gate - view from the outside.
Nevertheless, a scapegoat arrived in April 1547, but the besieged refused to surrender. British ships with food came to the castle again, but the Scots captured them. And so this "tug of war" would have continued further, but here in July 1547 King Henry II of France intervened in the conflict. He decided to send a fleet to take the castle for the Scottish government. Although the fleet was spotted by British observers, they assumed that Mary Stuart was on board. Meanwhile, 24 warships approached the shores of Scotland and blocked St. Andrews from the sea and the Firth of Forth.
Mine war underground galleries.
In general, the fruitless shelling from French ships continued for 20 days, after which the assault was launched, and the defenders were already exhausted from the plague. At the same time, the besiegers placed their guns even on the tower of the Church of St. Salvatore and the tower of the Cathedral of St. Andrews. The cannonade began before dawn on Saturday 30 July. The bombardment from land continued for several hours, and the castle's cannons responded actively, and even killed several rowers on the galleys of the French fleet.
The well that supplied the garrison with water.
The next day, the shelling of the castle from 14 guns on land continued, but then heavy rain silenced them. And then William Kirkaldi of Grange began negotiating surrender with Leone Strozzi, Prior of Capua, who was among the besiegers.
Meanwhile, the news that the French fleet was besieging the castle of St. Andrews reached London on 27 July. On August 1, 1547, Admiral Edward Clinton was ordered to travel to St. Andrews and assist its defenders "as quickly as the wind or weather permits." But … the bureaucracy in England was already working so "efficiently" that Clinton did not receive this order until August 9, when it was too late to take any action.
View of the castle courtyard and the gate tower.
As a result, the French took all those who surrendered as trophies and put them on the galleys as rowers. The British ambassador to France told Henry II that it was an unfriendly act towards Britain, "but friendly towards Scotland," the king replied. True, then a serious war with Scotland began, the Scots were defeated in it and Henry stopped supporting them, apparently thinking that those whom God favors, he sends victory, not defeat!
View of the castle from the sea at low tide.
The castle was badly destroyed, and subsequently significantly rebuilt by Archbishop John Hamilton, the illegitimate brother of the governor of Arran and successor to Cardinal Beaton.
The modern entrance to the castle.
Here is the end of the battle history of St. Andrews Castle. That's how they fought then, and it is very similar to how they are fighting now, isn't it?
